


Crossroads

by MotelsandDiners



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Ambiguous Behavior, Angst, Apocalypse, Bickering, Blood and Violence, Buried Humanity, But what else is new?, Cage-Fights, Castiel Mother Hens you, Castiel teaches you about the Supernatural, Characters with Agendas, Childish Dean, Creative License, F/M, Fearscape, Fights, First Meetings, Flashbacks, Gen, Healthy dose of Sarcasm and Humor, Memories, My OCs go through Hell, Mystery Characters - Freeform, OC POV, Old Beings, Psychological Trauma, Rowan literally cannot give two shits, Running from yourself, Shared Conscience, Slight fluff, Struggling to be a good person, Survival of the Fittest, The Plot Thickens, Things happen 'off-screen', Untimely Emergence of Abilities, alternating povs, because i am not writing 4 pages of Castiel telling you all about the supernatural, cabin in the woods, car crashes, demon OC, fights to the death, it aint happenin, mindfuckery, sassy characters, thought i should let you know
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-25
Updated: 2018-05-31
Packaged: 2018-11-18 23:20:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 43,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11300922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MotelsandDiners/pseuds/MotelsandDiners
Summary: After learning you are less than human you take off into the desolate land of U.S. intent to sort yourself out with the help of faithful Castiel. With nothing but bad memories behind you, you look forward, oblivious to the chaos that is quickly brewing around you. More than the Winchesters are after you now, and one angel may not be enough to protect you from the hidden dangers of the apocalypse. Secrets come to light, plans are uncovered, loyalties are tested, and in the midst of it all you must learn to accept what and who you are, fighting back against destiny, the darkness within you, and divinity itself. You may not like it, Y/N, but you're going to need some help.Continuation of the What's It To 'Ya? storyline.





	1. Get Gone

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, guys. I'm back! Here we go, Part Two! Who's excited? I know I am. Bear with me on the first chapter, literally all of this was written in the wee hours of the morning, so there definitely will be grammatical errors. Other than that, have it, friends.

CROSSROADS

PART TWO

April 18th

Rain. All the time. That’s all the weather seems to be capable of in Oregon. He thinks he’s seen the sun once in the last three years, and it was only a ten second stretch. The rainclouds had parted just enough for the sun to peek through and then disappear. It was like the sun couldn’t be bothered to show up in Oregon, as if the state was unworthy. Well, isn’t that fitting?

For him at least. He’s spent so much time inside he’s just about memorized the exact length of each floor from one wall to the other. Could probably traverse the entire compound with his eyes closed. Even with the devil’s traps hidden in light. In some places, he had devil’s traps put down on the floors in glow in the dark ink. Some on the ceiling.

He’s embarrassed to admit that for a while he had to carry around a black light to learn and remember exactly where they were. But now it’s muscle memory, his body instinctually knows what areas to avoid. Still leaves a large area to safely walk through, enough to stretch his legs, keep his head fresh. Enough of the floor is untouched that he can get a good idea of how supplies are running.

So far, they have enough food and water to last an entire year, ammunition for another six months. And other things, things that people looked at him funny for asking about, but got anyway. He had enough supernatural, black magic, hoo-doo- unspeakable things -to keep his needs met. He had what he needed to protect himself, and to also create weapons. Weapons not of carnal nature, but spiritual.

A war was coming, he could feel it. Feel it in his bones like a chill, like frost creeping from his toes up. But then, that just might be the weather, the rain makes everything cold. He’s down here because he’s bored, again. He doesn’t remember not being bored since he escaped. Of course, this is better than the Cage. Mostly. He still has to worry about Michael looking for him, Crowley no doubt would love to find out where he is, same with the Winchesters.

He sighs, being the potential center of attention is a lot more exhausting than he thought it would be. He figured it would be fun, entertaining. But no, it’s just been a shit ton of planning, of keeping his head down. Working in the shadows to keep things within his favor, working to keep you alive. He doubts you’ll thank him though, you never have been too grateful, especially where he’s involved. Still, he doesn’t need your gratitude.

He just needs you.

But, ugh…you’re…so…far away. And you’re still vulnerable, haven’t grown into your identity. You’re keeping company with an angel. It’s enough to make him drag his hands down his face. You’re so irritating and you aren’t even here in person irritating him. That’s impressive.

He doesn’t like this version of you. He hasn’t liked any of them if he’s being honest, but this is his chance. The only one he’s had in almost a thousand years. Ever since dear old dad stepped in and put an end to what you were. Ever since…

He sighs again, stops at the end of an aisle with a gritty pout. There’s an old holy fire ring here, on the off chance that angels drop by for a visit he has a few circles here and there, ready to be lit. The longevity of the oil aided by his stash of supernatural paraphernalia.

He’s getting so impatient. Screwed bored, he’s damned near crazy with stagnation.

Feet on a metal staircase tip-tapping their way down from the second floor, a hint of hurry in them. Good news. He needs good news, needs it more than he’s willing to admit.

A throat cleared. It’s Jim.

“Sir.”

“News. Good I hope?”

“I-…” Tim isn’t sure, but it’s a new development. “Y/N’s position has changed. She left town a few hours ago. She appears to be headed west.”

West. He wonders where you intend to land. Wonders how far you’ll make it. He wonders if you can make it here. “Former orders stand. Keep tabs but don’t engage…” He crouches down, drags the tip of a finger through the barely there holy fire ring, and speaks again. “Send that message out to the rest. Y/N has absolution. Not to be harmed, under any circumstances.” After that stupid incident that landed you in that ghost-town, he’s intent to make sure his idiotic zealots steer clear of you.

He can’t have you dying, not before he has a chance to meet you, have a nice little chat.

“Yes sir.”

He doesn’t hear the retreat of shoes on concrete. “Is there more?”

“Yes. That known associate of Y/N’s is also on the move, he’s no longer tailing Y/N.”

Oh? What, a change of orders from Crowley? Or, perhaps this is the betrayal he’s been hoping for. Let’s find out.

“Slim Jim, I have a job for you.” The readiness to serve is palpable behind him, and he lifts his head, staring at the wall ten feet in front of him. “I need you to find someone within the ranks that can track him down, and if not bring him here, then at least point him in the right direction.”

“Yes, sir. Right away.” Tim sprints his way back upstairs, sensing an urgency about this order.

Tim’s not wrong.

A door slams upstairs, a chair scrapes loudly on the floor and then it’s quiet again. He waits a long time before standing up, thoughts wandering. He’s somewhat wary about revealing his location to a demon he’s not certain is preparing to betray Crowley, but he supposes he can always kill the guy if it turns out bad.

In the meantime, he guesses he’ll just sit on his ass, and wait. No, he’ll do something productive, like track down his liberators. He knows without a doubt that they all still have the rings. He needs those in own possession, the only place he can be sure they’re safe. If the rings end up in the wrong hands he could find himself right back in the cage.

Hell, to everyone else the apocalypse is a nightmare, a never ending struggle of trying to survive, sleeping with one eye open, feeling eyes on the back of your neck 24/7. To him it’s one giant game of Where’s Waldo. He’s always looking for someone. Someone that matters, someone that can alter the landscape of the playing board drastically.

He can’t think of anywhere the three of them could be. They’re obviously still about, on the earth. Heaven shut itself up, locked the gates the very first day, so they have to be meandering somewhere in the wasteland. But where?

Where’s Waldo?

If only he knew their motives for freeing him, maybe that would give him an idea of where they are. Alas, he has no clue, no musings, nothing. He knows their names, but that doesn’t quite help. They aren’t allies, not by a long shot, he doesn’t have any of those, certainly not among his _brothers_ and _sisters_.

Still though, why did they set him free?

Perhaps he’s not the only clandestine player in this game. Maybe the excitement is going to pick up for him. He hopes so.

 

April 19th

“So, I won’t say I told so…but,”

Jace huffs in response, knowing that Dean is going to finish his comment. If there’s one thing Dean loves, it’s being right. Still, he won’t deny that he might have been a little hasty in his call for a forward march. It seems that sheer determination is enough for the mind, the body however…

“I told you so.” Dean finishes, smirking with triumph, even if he does have to back-pack Jace. It wasn’t too long after they left that night fell, lucky for Jace. That meant he could sleep, recuperate after only a few hours of walking.

The next day however (today) was another thing entirely. The whole day ahead of them.

Jace made it maybe four hours before he finally asked to stop, hands on his knees, wheezing.

Out in the open, on the road, literally. One short voting session later, one that Jace profusely argued, and he found himself being piggy-backed by Dean.

His scowl remained for a long while.

 “You know, I’d watch that smug attitude.” Jace says, tone flat, expression matching, and Dean takes the bait with a furrowed brow, and arrogance.

“Yeah, why’s that?”

A second later he finds out when Jace grabs a handful of his hair and pulls it, none too lightly.

“Ow!” Dean growls, head wrenched back, and when Jace lets go with a chuckle he snarls, “You little shit!”

Emily and Sam glance behind them, hearing Dean’s exclamation, and when they see Jace’s expression, they sigh. It’s going to be a long and very loud trip. Instead of engaging, they leave the two children be, knowing that if they got involved there’d just be a lot of finger pointing and arguing. And they need to save their painkillers for injuries, not headaches.

“What was that?” Jace asks, grinning, flexing his fingers to get another handful of Dean’s hair.

Dean’s never been one to back down from a challenge. The more childish, the better suited it was for him. So, he slips his hands down, reflexes quick and pinches the backs of Jace’s calves harshly.

“Dammit!” Jace cries, legs jolting. Dean laughs, boisterous, pleased with himself. But Jace retaliates quickly by getting a hand around his jaw, fingers underneath the bone, and pushes his thumb into the pressure point behind Dean’s ear.

“SONuva-!” Dean drops Jace’s legs with no warning, not even feeling bad about the way that Callahan hits the ground with a pained groan, a knee buckled beneath him. Dean rubs behind his ear, a deep frown etched into his face.

The sudden drop hurt, it seemed to jar his organs, make his bones knock into one another. Jace grimaces from his spot on the asphalt, glaring at the throb of his chest and stomach. And then he shoots that glare up at Dean, tight bright holding his tongue captive, but the bold anger in his eyes is obvious.

Eyes narrowed, Dean points at him from his hip. “Don’t you give me that look you little monster.”

Another quick glance over his shoulder and Sam weighs his options. Weighs them rationally, comes to a rational answer, but he just can’t be bothered to work it out. He continues walking, eyes on their way to rolling.

Emily’s mouth is pursed. “It’s escalating, isn’t it?” her shoulders sag in future preparation.

Sam shoots his gaze behind him again. Jace is standing, glowering and Dean has his stance widened, knees slightly bent-

“N-no. It’s fine- They’re fine.” He lies, which is futile because a second later they both hear Dean yell in surprise. Crestfallen, they both turn around, and set their eyes on an imminent headache.

Jace had tackled Dean to the ground, a move that required all his weight thrown into the larger man’s legs, his shoulder in Dean’s stomach. At the moment, they’re both grappling one another, deflecting holds on fabric, compromising firm adjustments, trying at the same time to get away, but also to keep the other at the mercy of their own hands.

“Which one do you want?” Sam asks, scratching at his jaw. But Emily ignores him completely and marches to the two almost grown adults fighting in the middle of a deserted road in the sweltering heat. He watches her go, she seems determined, mercilessly so.

Sam drops the bags he’s carrying. His own, Dean’s, and Jace’s, though Jace’s was thrown in with Dean’s so only two bags hit the ground. Dean can carry them, Sam has a feeling after this that neither Dean or Jace will be keen to be around each other for a while.

Emily reaches them with her hands on her hips, a stern look on her face, and it takes the two of them a moment to register her shadow over them. But when they do, they stagger their eyes up, dread in them.

Jace is the first one to speak. “Emily, look. I know this-“

She points at him, blue eyes intense and his jaw snaps shut immediately. “Shut it, Callahan.” And then she turns her gaze on Dean, certain he’s going to try talking too. And she’s right because his mouth is open. “You too, Winchester. Not a word.”

Sam watches with a happy smile, a giant, humored, dimple flaring smile as Emily tears into the two of them. This is something he wishes he could record, but he needs to save his phone’s battery. He charged it while at the farmhouse, took a walkie-talkie, satellite phone too- but anyway, his phone’s battery won’t last forever.

His pocket vibrates, and for a second Sam can only blink in the sun. Give him a break, it’s literally been months since he’s gotten a text from anyone. Cas always texts or calls Dean first; the only reason Cas would call Sam (or text him) was if he couldn’t get a hold of Dean.

Sam turns his back to the giant squabble, the scolding going on behind him and whips his phone out of his pocket. Sure enough, he has a new text message.

From Cas.

It’s short and sweet, curt.

**Sam, I am still with Y/N, keeping her safe. We are on the road, no destination in mind. Be careful, Sam.**

Sam sighs. He didn’t expect Cas to divulge your location, or even what direction the two of you are headed in, but that’s not what made him sigh. It was the warning at the end, the caution, the still there worry about his safety.

Cas still cares about them, even after what happened. He’s still loyal to some degree which Sam is sure is tearing him up inside. After all, the angel is travelling with you now, even feeling something that isn’t plain animosity for Dean and him would surely seem like a betrayal of sorts to the angel.

 Still, it’s a relief to know that you’re alive, that Cas intends to stick with you, keep you out of trouble. You seem to have a nose for finding it.

Shoes scuffling towards him forces Sam to slip his phone back into his pocket. He’ll talk to Dean later, let him know what’s up. Speaking of, Dean passes him, scooping up the two bags while he does it, a deep scowl wrinkling his brow.

Sam pops his eyebrows, at least until Emily brushes past him, shoulders squared, heels striking the road heatedly. Ah, she separated the two bickering children he realizes. And then he realizes that leaves him with Jace.

He peeks over his shoulder and finds Jace there, pouting petulantly, staring past him at Emily and Dean, properly agitated at both of them. Sam idly wonders if this is how Dean felt when Sam would fight with their dad. At the time ,the fights seemed so important, though, from an outsiders view it was easy to see that there was no point to it. Like here.

“You want to walk for a while?” Sam asks Jace, knowing the teenager would probably like to save some face. After getting told off it would just add wood to the fire that is his embarrassment if he had to be piggy-backed immediately after.

Jace nods sullenly, jams his hands into jeans pockets and begins trudging after Emily and Dean who’ve gotten a head start on them. That’s how time passes for a good ten minutes, that’s how long it takes Jace’s offense and indignation to fade, or to simmer down to something tolerable.

“She’s stressed.” He remarks coldly, factually, and Sam peers sideways at Jace.

Of course she is- “We’re all stressed.” He points out, but Jace shakes his head.

“No, it’s gotten worse every passing day. First there was finding a way to tell me about Quin,” Jace pauses for a second, distance creeping into his eyes until he can find his way back. “Then I got shot,”

_Then you died,_ Sam mentally adds, corners of his mouth twitching down.

“Now, Rowan and Y/N are missing.” Jace rolls his shoulders loose, looking at Emily’s stiff ones make his feel tight.

“Before I got kidnapped she used to smile all the time, laugh too.” He sighs, remembering the times he’s talking about. “And cook…I miss her cooking.” He smiles, an ache in it. “And she used to sing late at night when she thought everyone was asleep…but we’d all stay awake in our rooms just to listen to her.”

Jace drops his gaze, kicks at a rock, and listens to the silence between him and Sam. He doesn’t expect Sam to say anything. What exactly could be said? He doesn’t know if Sam has nothing to say, or if he’s just waiting for Jace to fill quiet with more words. Waiting to hear more.

He’ll talk more, he feels like he needs to. Maybe if does, Sam will have some idea of how to help her. Jace may be young but he isn’t blind, far from it. Ever since he saw Emily and Sam together, merely within three feet of each other, he knew there was something between them.

“Emily was the glue that held us all together in the beginning. Made us a family, reminded us we were a family when times would get hard and we’d all wonder…wonder about the people we shared a dinner table with.”

Sam stares at her, watches her shiny blonde hair sway across her back, the sun lighting the top of her head so bright it almost blinds him. He can see it, effortlessly. He knows she’s strong, focused, a go-getter, and she doesn’t give up. She’s the type of person that’s all or nothing.

So, of course she’s put everything into keeping her new family together. Because she cares, cares about them the way Sam and Dean care about each other. She risked her life to find Jace, was willing to die just on a hunch to save him. Was going to walk headlong into death in an attempt to break him out of a high-security prison she had no chance getting into.

“Getting us all back together: that’s everything to her. I know she feels responsible for Quin’s death, I do. I’m sure Y/N does, Rowan too. That’s one member of the family that we aren’t getting back. She’s hell-bent on finding Y/N and Rowan, convinced herself that what happened to Quin is never going to happen again.” Again, he stops talking, sweeps his eyesight along the road, and removes his hands from his pockets to run them through his hair.

“I think she’s forgotten that this isn’t a solo effort. I don’t think she realizes she’s still the glue that holds the family together. Doesn’t see what’s right in front of her.”

“…right in front of her?” Sam repeats, eyebrows raised and emotions guarded, pushes logic right up to bat when a response is needed. Anything less would just be inviting disaster.

“Yeah. Like I said: she’s the glue that holds the family together.” Jace captures Sam’s inquiring gaze, and keeps it until Sam breaks away, hazel eyes softening. A silence settles, a silence perhaps that feels awkward. And not because Sam refuses what Jace is saying, only that he feels guilty Jace said it.

Feels guilty because…what Sam and Dean have done in the last couple of weeks are things that no one would do to family. Feels guilty because he’s still lying to Jace and Emily. Guilt by omission. That’s what it is.

Sam feels guilty because no matter what happens when everybody meets up…he’ll stand by Dean. Even if it all goes to Hell. That’s where he’ll stand.

Next to Dean. Just like he always has.

“Anyway,” Jace bursts, sensing the shift in mood, the unease. “maybe you could talk to her later? I get the feeling she’s gonna be mad at me for a while.” Jace smirks, amber eyes glinting in amusement, glee. “I’m sure if this happened back at the farmhouse she’d have tried grounding Dean and I.”

Sam snorts, almost sad that it didn’t happen at the farmhouse. He’d give up tomorrow’s dinner to watch that.

“She would have succeeded.” Sam muses, and Jace laughs in agreement, nodding.

Bugs buzz and zip by them, birds dip and swoop in the fields nearby, snatching insects out of mid-air. They sing and titter, call to each other, fight with one another over areas of heavily populated grass. Larger birds caw and grate screeches down at them from higher up, riding air currents in search of dead animals, or any type of corpse that can provide a meal.

“If you had to guess-“

“What?” Jace interrupts, Sam’s words so abrupt that it startled him.

Sam glides right over, “If you had to guess about where Y/N is, where would you shoot in the dark?”

“You mean…if she hasn’t been kidnapped, and is just high-tailing it?” Putting that if in there tastes bitter, but he does it.

Sam nods, and Jace tugs his hair back through his fingers, pulls it down behind his ears. “I’m not entirely sure. I think she’d head west though.”

“West? Why?”

Jace shrugs. “Well, the east hasn’t exactly been friendly to her. She’s from southern Maine, and her parents died there not too long after everything ended. She spent a year travelling on her own before she finally reached South Carolina and met Rowan and Emily. I can’t imagine that year was a cakewalk,” the only surviving Callahan rubs at his jaw, the itchiness there that seems to be all over his jaw and chin.

Sam blinks, brow creased as he listens to Jace talk, listens to new information rise to the surface of the murky pond that is your past.

“West would be a clean slate for her, you know? It’s also warmer out west. She’s not too fond of the cold.” Ok, get some fingernails in this itchiness, rubbing isn’t doing anything. “Why, what are you thinking?”

_I’m thinking that Y/N and Castiel are headed west._

“Nothing…it’s just- what are the chances that Rowan and Y/N got kidnapped? I mean, honestly. You know the two of them.” He’s throwing darts at a board while blind-folded.

“It’s a possibility…but it’s one I don’t believe.” Jace claims, nodding, and drops his hand. His face still itches, but he doesn’t want to break skin, something he’s sure he’s close to doing.

Good, so it won’t seem so strange when the question of where to go comes up. He’ll have Jace on his side, and convincing Dean of it will be easier than bribing him with pie. Effortless.

Jace groans, squints his eyes in ire and Sam glances at him with one side of his mouth askew in a curious dimple. Without prompting, Jace elaborates. “Why are they walking so fast?”

Sam looks ahead at the noticeable distance between Jace and himself and Dean and Emily. It isn’t that they’re walking fast, it’s just that Jace is walking slowly. But it can’t be helped, he’s not at one hundred percent, and Sam isn’t going to blast ahead and leave him behind at the back of the pack.

“They aren’t walking fast.” Jace realizes with a disappointed grimace, sighs at himself. He glances over at Sam, considers something, and Sam thinks it’s just him figuring out how to ask for help. But it isn’t. Instead, it’s, “Keep up.”

And Jace takes off in a jog, something he shouldn’t be doing, but damn that kid’s pride. Sam shakes his head, fondness in the gesture, and legs it after him. After this, Sam’s certain Jace is going need piggy-backed, no getting around it.

But that’s fine. He doesn’t mind helping Jace. Not one bit.

 

April 19th 1 p.m. (roundabouts, anyway)

 

I realize a little late, too late: you leave that town. It’s half a hunch, half sixth sense. It’s mostly dread in my stomach, resignation, a type of regret, perhaps some anger. But I don’t turn around, I keep going on the course I’ve set for myself. I’ve got ground to cover, not a lot but enough that I can’t spare time to turn back and tail you. I’m almost to the farmhouse, and maybe I teleported too much because I haven’t found anyone out on the road, at all.

I’m grateful, but disappointed. You know, that itch still needs to be scratched. Oh well. I’ve more important things to worry about. Such as the person that’s been tailing me for the past 3 miles. They’re human, otherwise there would have been a confrontation already, blood spilled. They’ve also walked, quite literally followed me as only humans can: painstakingly. Only one of them, because I haven’t been ambushed.

I can’t think of a reason anyone would follow me, just one guy without any supplies or weapons or a vehicle. I left the motorbike in that village; I can go back for it later, no caution there. I have nothing to offer to onlookers, to looters or desperate survivors. I mean, even my pockets are empty, just lined with lint.

This person is perhaps a few hundred feet behind me, walking in the ditch beside the road, hidden by the tall grass and slope of land, but I can sense them. These heightened senses aren’t for nothing, aren’t just something to brag about.

Okay. I’m torn between curious and pissed, but I can remedy both at the same time. It won’t be long before I reach the farmhouse, and I’d rather arrive on the porch steps alone.

A hop-skip and I’m there, just a few feet behind my stalker who seems struck dumb at my sudden disappearance. Maybe disappointed if I’m reading their sloped shoulders right. Well, I hate to leave people hanging.

“And that was with my eyes closed.” I say, no louder than a murmur, but I might as well have thrown hot coals at this guy’s back because he jumps with a yell and twists on his heels to face me. But his foot gets caught in sneaky stalks of grass and he falls flat on his ass, staring up at me with his mouth agape. “Not impressed? I can make object disappear too.” More silence, but his lips tremble, tongue wobbles around behind his teeth, and I smile.

Talk about biting off more than you can chew. Poor guy doesn’t know what he’s in for.

“Like this,” I continue, and with a flourish of my hand, I have a knife in my palm. This guy’s, previously held in his boot. His eyes widen, comically, and he stutters around syllables that sound like words but just aren’t quite there yet. “Y’don’t start talkin’ I’m gonna make this disappear.”

That he seems to understand because he puts a hand up, arm stretched out in front of him and says, “Wait- wait! I have a message for you!”

What’s that now? I’m more curious than I am pissed, at least at this moment.

“Message? From who?” I swear if it’s from Crowley I’m going to shove this knife down his throat.

“From my leader. He’s been hoping to meet with you.”

His leader. A name would be nice. I drag my gaze over him, eyes narrowed in supsicion, until I see the pattern on his shirt. Up near the breast paint has been applied to draw a symbol. The paint was most likely once red, but now it’s browner, rust colored. An altar of fire.

I whistle in realization, and then sneer. “Why does your cult leader wanna talk to me?”

The man shifts on his spot in the grass, “We aren’t a cult, we’re a church.” He weakly protests, or maybe he’s correcting me, I don’t care.

“Same thing.” I shrug, and then point the knife at him. He sobers up quite quick, eyes locked on the glinting blade. “What’s his business with me?”

“He…wants to make a deal.”

A deal. This sounds sketchy. But interesting enough and fortuitous. I wanted to know who was leading the cult, and here the cult leader wants to meet. Talk about coincidence, if you believe in it.

“What kind of deal?” I run a finger along the edge of the knife, curiosity dampening the dangerous air about me I suppose. The man on the ground stands, feeling comfortable, eased by my interest in this probably proposition.

“I’m not sure, he didn’t say. Only that he wanted to meet you-“

“Where is he?” I interrupt, not caring to hear a repeat. The messenger hesitates, glances at the blade in my hand, and thinks better of pissing me off when I angle it just right and send light reflecting into his eyes.

“Oregon…in a compound up north.”

Oregon. Big state, lots of mountains, valleys, wildlife…a lot of looking will be involved. I zero in on the human in front of me, the speed of his pulse, the way the walls of his lungs struggle for steadiness, and then I listen to each grow weak and hasty when I let the black flood my eyes. Or maybe not. Maybe this can all be made simple.

“Think ya could be a little more specific?” I know he can, he does too if the bead of sweat rolling down his temple is any kind of statement.

“It’s just a few miles north of Apiary, close to a river, deep into a knot of forest.”

Apiary, river, forest. Got it.

I shoot him a wink, peel my lips to flash him a smile, “Thanks, mate. I appreciate it.” And shove the knife into his stomach, relishing the soft give and the blood that seeps, the bug-eyed stare I’m given. I twist the blade where it rests, listening to flesh tear and muscles separate, twist until the sharp edge is facing skywards and I yank it up through his ribcage, through those organs just not quite protected as well as they could be, and tear him open up to the collar-bone, blood pouring from him.

His insides spill from him like stuffing from a toy animal, in one great glob that falls sadly, heavily. Only in this case, it’s much messier. A good portion of my shirt is soaked, somewhere around his ribcage his legs gave out and I had to get a hand on the back of his neck to hold him steady while I cut away at him.

I lean down, crouch on my toes a few inches from gleaming, steaming pool of blood and intestines, and I talk. The fall, as well laying on his side helped his insides slide out of him a little easier. I could have just disemboweled him…but... “You know, I barely missed your heart, not an accident I’ll have you know, and nicked your lungs.” I was threatened with this once, back in the old days. Immediately afterwards, I tried it out on the man that threatened me. That was a very messy day.

“So, instead of bleeding out, which would take anywhere from one to two minutes, you’re going to choke on your own blood,” the last part is all me, typically, this would be enough to kill anyone in a matter of seconds, but…

I lay a hand on his shoulder, force his pulse to slow, manipulate the blood flow, and I watch him die, nice and slow. Listen to his ragged breathing get wet and bubbly until it’s just garbles and gurgles, red dribbling from the corners of his mouth, and then I force his heart faster like he’s running a marathon, and I grin as blood practically bursts from his mouth.

There’s blood coming out of his nose, pouring from his mouth and I know his airway is blocked. But even still, I keep his heart going, keep it pumping, forcing his heart to pump blood only for it to end up in the dirt.

Talk about a bad day, huh?

“Alright, I’ve seen enough,” I sigh, and take my hand off him. His heart stops immediately. I pout woefully, lay a hand over my heart. “That’s rough, buddy.”

I stand, stretch my arms above my head and groan in satisfaction at the luxurious pull of muscles. That itch has been scratched. Thank goodness. I can’t imagine what would have happened if you were the first person I’d met since all of this. Well, actually, I can. It would have been this.

I glance down at myself, the stickiness of my shirt, and roll my lips into my mouth. Guess I’m going to need a change of clothes when I get to the farmhouse. I bend down, wipe my hands clean on the hem of this guy’s shirt, and start on my way, whistling Beyond the Sea as I go.

I have a feeling it’s going to be a good day.

April 19th (just on the border of SC) 2 p.m.

 

Today is the worst day in the history of ‘worst days ever’.

I flick my sopping wet hair out of my eyes, bangs of dark ebony that just don’t seem to want to stay tied back into a pony-tail, and shoot a glare over my shoulder at my pouting, guilt ridden, dramatic companion. _He’s_ completely dry, in case you’re wondering.

Ahead of me, my other friend is unconcerned, uncompassionate, focus driven straight. He’s tired, tired not in body, but in mind and spirit. I feel that way too, but only because of the sun. But, that’s not what I was talking about.

I was talking about the worst day ever, and it’s all this idiot’s fault behind me-

“Come on, Le, I didn’t mean to-“ He pipes up at my heels, apology in his eyes of deep brown flecked with amber.

“Stay out of my head unless you wish to lose yours…brother.” I warn, unforgiveness dragging my tone through rocks and turbulent water.

“Enough, the both of you.” Comes the order from up front on a weary voice, but patience is hidden beneath the fatigue. I watch his silvery curtain of hair sway as he shakes his head at us. I wonder about his hair sometimes; his vessel is young, hardly out of his twenties if I remember correctly.

“We don’t have the safety, the liberty to bicker amongst ourselves. The world may be quiet, but I can assure you: we are hunted.”

I’ve heard this before, it’s starting to lose its note of authenticity. I block his voice out, though it’s the voice of reason we often look to for guidance.

“It is us against this rotten husk of a world, no one to trust or rely on but one another. We can expect no aid from our brethren, nor any sanctuary from the filth that covers the land-“

I sail right past him, eyelids drooping and Maalik is right with me when I do, looking equally bored if the hand ruffling through the back of his curly ombre hair is any indication. He always toys with his hair when he’s distracted.

“We must remain vigilante, and steadfast, loyal to one another and above all we must remain-“

“Hey, K, are you coming or what?” I call over my shoulder, slipping my hands into my black tweed trench coat. Always with the speeches and lectures, he hasn’t changed in the millennia since the last time we were together.

“…aware.” K finishes limply, sighing at the backs of his friends. One of these days…

“One these days, what?” I ask, turning my head as he appears next to me, his jawline, temple, and his eye obscured by the shining hair resting on his collar-bone.

“You’re going to see I’m not just full of empty words.”

“No,” I agree, and nod. I shoot a wink at Maalik, and he grins. “you’re over-flowing with them.” I say, and cock my head towards K. I don’t receive a response, he’s too seasoned, too calm and emotionally dead to bite back.

“So,” Maalik pipes up, adjusting the bright red scarf layered around his neck, heaped up on his shoulders. The tails of it are quite long, they reach his knees, bouncing and smacking his legs as he walks. “Where are we headed, exactly?”

“To find Dumah…but before that, we must secure Raziel, keep him safe. He is no doubted targeted, hunted more-so than we are. I would not be surprised if he has already been captured.”

“Damn, this is-“

“Le, don’t curse, it’s unbecoming.”

“-going to be a pain in the ass.”

“Le…”

I grin despite myself. “We still don’t know where we’re going.”

“To the epicenter of this mess.”

Oh, joy. Doesn’t that sound like a party? I have a feeling we aren’t invited to it either.

 

April 19th 3 p.m.

 

Arms above your head, bag swinging against your hip as you walk, you yawn widely. It’s hot today, awfully so. You had no choice but to sweep your hair up into a bun and tie your jacket around your waist. Castiel doesn’t seem to be effected by the heat, he’s still wearing all of his layers, and hasn’t so much made a peep about the uncomfortable conditions.

You have enough supplies to last you for quite some time. Merely a few cans of non-perishables and a bottle of water, a rolled up blanket tied to the strap of your bag and your revolver anchored into the waistband of your jeans.

The suns at your back, as well as that town, a few miles between you and it. The farther you put everything behind you, the higher your spirit lifts, your cares thrown to the wind.

Arms lightly swinging, footsteps soft, you turn on your heel, intent to start a conversation with him when you stop. Stop the words in your mouth, stop your thoughts, stop your feet. Stop everything.

Castiel cocks his head at you, curious. “What’s-“

But he never finishes, he’s interrupted by trembling ground, howling wind, and an explosion. All from that tiny village on the horizon. He turns, eyes narrowed and watches a billowing cloud of grey and black climb the sky in roiling plumes of smoke and dispersing fire. And then he sees something that has his eyes widening: trees bending in the wind, trunks snapped clean in half, dust like a wall, ceilings of buildings taken off, cars blown over, the road being lifted and broken into crumbling slabs.

And all of it’s due course straight for the both of you.

“What the Hell’s going on back there?” You wonder aloud, voice loud not from terror but because the wind is so loud.

Castiel doesn’t intend to find out. He zaps in front of you, inches away, and grabs your arm. “We’re leaving.” He informs you, voice firm, and whisks you away, hardly thinking of where to go. Just away from here.

Not a moment after the two of you disappear the mayhem arrives, taking the road in the blink of an eye, tearing the ground apart in great craters and crags, debris pelting the earth at random. A body rolls through the dust, thrown like a rag doll, bounces once off a floating chunk of dirt and road and then finds stability by putting a hand down to the ground, fingers digging into quivering earth as he’s pushed back a few hundred feet.

Ahead, figures emerge out of the raging dust storm, unperturbed at the disaster around them, the still howling wind, the dangerous velocity of things flying through the air. So too, is the one apposing them.

In fact, he’s excited.

“It’s a good thing I like a challenge.” His eyes shift obsidian, and he stands.

 

 

Your feet hit the ground, knees wobbly and sway a fraction. Castiel takes a step away, does a slow 360 to gauge the area and its safety, blue eyes narrowed to mere slits. You recover quick, rub a hand down your face. “What the hell did we just escape from? That wasn’t a natural disaster.”

Castiel doesn’t answer. Because he doesn’t know. He only knows that if he hadn’t flown the two of you out of there, you might have been killed.

Castiel peers over your head, ignoring you and you sigh in exasperation, shaking your head. After a moment of letting adrenaline slowdown in your system, you take a gander around you and frown in distaste, hunch your shoulders.

“Why did you zap us to a graveyard?”

“It was all I could think of at the time.” Is his simple answer, not aware of how strange it is.

You crack a tiny smile at him, and shrug, brushing it off. He saved your life, who cares about the locale he picked to do it? Out of habit, you sweep your gaze, reading headstones, simply because they’re there to be read.

You swivel your head to read the one you’re standing on, and gape. And then you rub your eyes, look again because surely you’re misreading. The headstone is faded, taken over with ivy, but you can read some of it.

The name on the slab of stone: Dean Winchester 1979 – 20 (ivy interrupts the rest of the date)

“We should continue on.” Castiel says, already starting down a row of headstones, not bothering to wait for you. He pretends he doesn’t notice the way you stare at the headstone in front of you, feigns ignorance about the entire area.

You contemplate reaching out and tearing the vines off, but after a second of hesitation, you decide to leave it be. With one last long stare at the grave marker, a pit in your stomach, you take off after Castiel, heaviness on your mind. You slip your hand into your satchel, come in contact with soft leather and relax a fraction.

But just a fraction.


	2. Muddy Water

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If someone would have told him three years ago what his life would be like today...he would've punched them in the face. If somebody today told him what his life is going to be like in three years, he'd stab them in the throat. Dramatic? Hardly. On another note, today has gone really well. His favorite jacket, his favorite gun, and a wonderful, sleek, well-loved muscle car. Hey, good things happen to bad people. It happens.

April 19th 3ish.

Fresh clothes, fresh perspective on life. Look good, feel good. Which is surprisingly true, because he feels great. The fact that the farmhouse is empty almost doesn’t affect him. Almost, he is a bit bummed. Living room has been organized, but is still a mess as a whole unit. Upstairs is about the same, some things just can’t be cleaned away.

For a time, he stands on the stairs staring at the railing he was impaled upon about a week ago, stares like he expects it apologize, or offer condolences. When nothing changes around him, when his view stays the same, he reaches out and tears the post, wood splintering and cracking.

He tosses the flimsy post down the stairs, pads up the wood planks, curling a lip at the bullet holes in the floor. Rooms untouched, for the most part. Bedsheets are wrinkled, blankets tossed to the floor, windows cracked open. The Callahan’s room is still a wreck, but there wasn’t much that could be done to clean it up.

Emily’s room. He steps foot in, stands in the middle, flicks his gaze around. Takes in the lack of guns, ammunition, scopes. Of course she’d take everything with her. He drags a finger through the dust on top of her dresser, a thick film of gray coating the pad of his index finger. And then he glances at the spots of wood devoid of dust at all.

An ammunition box and a scope. And…Rowan lays a hand on a small slice of clean dresser, rectangular, a few inches of space behind it before a triangular shape in the grime becomes apparent. He lingers a moment, trying to remember what sat here.

But somehow, his memory fails him, and he moves on. He hovers in the doorway, back to her room, hesitating for a reason he can’t place.

_“We’re family now. We stick together, that’s what we do.”_

Rowan shakes his head, a crease in his brow and peers over his shoulder, half-expecting her to be sitting on the edge of her bed, polishing the stock of her rifle. But it’s empty, just dust gliding along on stale air, sunlight cutting through the thin sheet of dirt on the window. Shadows crawling on the floor, fading in and out in the light.

_“Or we die together.”_

Clear as day, like she’s in the room he hears her voice. Rowan back-pedals out of the room, into the hallway, eyeing the confines of her bedroom like he expects it all to melt and come after him. He slams her door shut from where he is, leaning against the railing.

It’s quiet, like it should be. The stillness that comes from abandonment. But then, quite suddenly, it isn’t quiet anymore.

_“Quin won’t let me have a gun.”_

Rowan turns, leans over the railing to listen, to look. Because he can hear footsteps, two pairs.

_“And?”_

That’s…him. From who knows how long ago? But yes, that’s him. Just a little younger, hair shorter, stubble less apparent. But without a doubt, Rowan is looking at himself. He remembers wearing that jacket, lined with short red fox fur around the collar and cuffs of the sleeves. He misses it-

_“And I need one. Brass knuckles and a knife isn’t going to do anything in a gun fight.”_

Rowan remembers this conversation too.

_“So, then stay outta of gun fights,” past him reaches behind to ruffle Jace’s hair. Not slowing his pace up the stairs._

It’s strange seeing this play out, removed from the scene, but still very much a part of it. He wonders if there’s something wrong with him. If he’s finally snapped or something…

_“Teach me…or I’ll teach myself.” Jace stubbornly declares at the top step, and the younger version of Rowan stops dead._

_“Now, wait a minute-“_

 The image wavers, shimmers as the scene carries on, as the conversation flows, but there’s no audio, no substance to it. Rowan can see through the past versions of himself and Jace. And then they disappear altogether.

What the Hell is going on here?

A scream erupts from downstairs, shrill, high-pitched and he recognizes it like he’d recognize his name. He scurries down the steps, heart pounding, and reaches for the gun he no longer carries strapped to his thigh.

But before he can worry about his scrambled brain, he’s hit the landing and has his mouth open to say-

_“Y/N, what’s happened?” The past version of himself litterally runs right through him, and it feels like cold water douses him down to his bones._

Rowan’s teeth chatter a moment as he watches this new scene. You’re there, standing up on the coffee table, pistol in hand aimed at the floor, looking this way and that. Rowan twitches a smile, he remembers this too.

_“It’s in here, somewhere.” You say, flicker your gaze up to him, and then look back down, resuming your frantic search from atop the table._

_“What’s in here?” Rowan asks, eyelids drooping in bored expectation. He slides his gun back into its holster, and crosses his arms over his chest._

_He gets his answer a second later when something small, but long and skinny scurries out from behind the bookcase and shoots underneath the couch, no doubt spurred on by your shrieking. You point your gun at the couch, curl your finger around the trigger and prepare to open Holy Hell on the furniture when Rowan stops you._

_“Y/N, don’t. You. Dare.” He points at you warily, half-certain you’re going to open fire anyway._

_“But, it’s under the couch.” You protest, waving your gun at it in dread._

_Rowan sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose and holds up a hand to tell you to wait. You shift from foot to foot on the table as he puts two fingers in his mouth and blows._

_Not a second later, Duke bounds up from the basement, nails clacking, tail wagging, ears tall and flounders to a stop at Rowan’s feet with a happy little bark. Rowan pats him on the head, whistles twice, two quiet, soft notes, and then points at the couch._

_Duke hunkers down, puts his nose to the floor, catches a scent and then shoots at the couch, tears around the front of it to shove his head underneath and bark. That tiny, black and white shape zooms out from underneath, and it corralled outside by Duke._

_Rowan and you both listen to his barking for a couple moments, until he clears his throat, and cocks an eyebrow at you. “It’s safe now, Y/N. The monster is gone.” He soothes mockingly, lips pulling up as you scowl and hop down._

Rowan watches for as long as he can, until his eyes strain and he trying to force the memory. Until he’s trying to convince himself that the memory is on-going and hasn’t already faded into nothing. He sinks down to sit on the bottom step, rests his elbows on a higher step and stretches his long legs out in front of him.

The calm that settles feels like a lie, a bold-faced lie. Because it’s quiet, quiet on the outside, contained from a storm by a box of glass. Even now, there are soft whispers around him, moments of life within this house playing out in respective rooms, in corridors, hallways, on the porch, on the steps, leaning against a wall.

The floors seem to tremble with footsteps, the walls shiver with hushed words, as if straining to hear, the ceiling dips to get closer. It all feels as if something is trying to get in, while something else even stronger is trying to get out.

And he sits, blinking and thoughtful as he waits for one to win.

But eventually, he tires of sitting, of anticipating and gets up.

The group isn’t here. They’ve been here and left, taken supplies, and hit the road. In what direction, he’s not sure. But that doesn’t matter much anymore.

He pounds up the steps, rolls up his sleeves of Egyptian blue and blocks out the noise surrounding him. Noise he’s sure isn’t even there.

Rowan knows that wherever they go, the intent is to find you. That’s always been the intent of the Winchesters; to find you. And now that Emily and Jace are attached to them, bolted in, duct-taped, zip-tied, roped, shanghaied…

There’s more people looking for you. More than you know. Rowan isn’t worried about the humans after you, he’s worried about Crowley, the cult which has been interested in you since day one, other players in the game. He’s sure they are more, how can there not be?

Three years into this, there have to be things lurking in the shadows. It’s never just the threats that are easily perceived, there are others with hidden agendas. Especially with you, with what that book revealed…Rowan wouldn’t be surprised if every big and bad out there was looking for you.

He turns down the hallway, stomping, his thoughts bleeding into actions. When he opens the closet, he about takes the door off its hinges. Dust billows out, starchy air, a couple moths, and he waves it all away with a tight expression.

It’s there, where he left it all those months ago, hung up on a rack, nestled between a grey pea coat and dark yellow parka. He snatches it, shakes it out, and heads out back the way he came, jacket swinging from his fingers by the furry collar.

Scents hit him when he emerges at the stairs. Some of it pleasant: cinnamon and sugar from an apple pie, lemon citrus from cleaning supplies, clean linen, wildflowers, lavender and vanilla: someone’s shampoo.

Other scents sneak in. Gunpowder, blood, musty air, the tang of sweat, wet earth. They all hide underneath the sweetness, under the ease and comfort of scents that call him home. It’s like context clues, or an encryption, ulterior motive. Poison mixed in with honey because it all goes down so easy.

He punches his arms through the sleeves of his jacket, thunders down the steps through all the ghosts of memories past, blood running cold as versions of his family slide through him like he’s made of air and nothing else.

His teeth don’t chatter this time, he doesn’t even blink, doesn’t watch a better life play out around him. Tries not to miss it as he leaves.

The door slams shut behind him like punctuation, something final and loud, and right. Much like the jacket on his shoulders, and the gun strapped to his thigh. Both things feel right.

The sweet scent of cinnamon-

He goes back to the church, back to the place he became a hero. The building has all but given up on standing, the lean he noticed before is heavier, wider. He ventures around the side, peering in dust-caked windows at rows of old, abandoned pews. He thinks nothing of the stand-off here, not of you, beaten and bloody.

He thinks of the Winchesters, the hate he felt for them before. Before. Now, he doesn’t so much curl a lip at the memory of them. Apathetic. That’s what he is about them. Around the corner he goes, behind the church and its ivy-covered back door, the green vines snaked up peeling white boards like snakes.

Down the hill he goes, toward the edge of forest. It’s easy to find because he’s looking for it. Giant branches pulled over the hood and windshield of the Impala, the roof hidden by branches still attached to trees.

A snap of his fingers and the branches are gone. The body of the old Chevy gleams slightly, clinging to the vestiges of the last polishing the oldest Winchester gave her. But she’s due for a wash, a buff here and there.

Rowan drags a hand along the hood on the way to the driver’s door, coaxing the engine to life. He slides in behind the wheel with a big grin, caramel eyes sparkling in childish glee. On instinct, he reaches for the radio only to stop short.

Curious, he hits the eject button on the console and out pops a cassette tape. Familiar.

Rowan snatches, turns it over to read the tape, and quirks an eyebrow with a fond smirk. Shrugging, he shoves it back in, lets it play the first song, and puts the Impala in drive, tapping a hand on the steering wheel.

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ryue0-3Lbns> (Feel free to read first, and then give the song a listen)

He’ll have to keep a sharp eye: it’s a long way to Oregon.

He beams a grin, care-free, self-entertained, and hums along with the song.

 

Dean stops mid-step, gaze far-off, until a grimace of untold pain covers his features. He glances behind him, at all the miles they’ve walked, and frowns harder.

“What’s up? What’s with the face?” Sam asks, having realized Dean stopped walking.

Dean shakes his head, hardly noticing that he’s rubbing a hand over his chest. “I think somebody…just stole Baby.”

Sam’s expression falls flat. “What?”

Dean nods, firmer, certain about this feeling that’s like sludge in arteries. “Somebody took my Baby. I can feel it.” He declares, glaring at the horizon.

Sam flits his gaze along the very horizon Dean’s scrutinizing. “…right.” And turns on his heel to continue on their way.

Dean looks over his shoulder at Sam, looks at the horizon, at Sam. Pouts, “My Baby.” He sends a sorrowful gaze at the trail they’ve blazed, refuses to say goodbye in words and swivels on his heels before he can contemplate. If anyone asks, he sniffles because the air is dry, and his eyes water because there’s dust in the wind.

 

Rowan rolls down the window, sticks his arm out and waves his arm through the air like a dolphin riding the currents. Music spills from his open window, tearing across the open fields and cracked roads like the epitome of rock culture: loud, unfaltering, unapologetic.

His hair whips in his face, but it’s not nearly enough to dampen his smile. Maybe getting to Oregon won’t take so long. He swears, as he passes through a crossroads, that he catches a teasing scent of apple pie. And smells blood underneath the sting of cinnamon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jesus, I've forgotten how much I love Rowan and I don't even know how that happened. I had to throw in some humor at the end of this chapter, couldn't resist what with a demon taking Dean's pride and joy for his own. Had to. Next Chapter will be Castiel and reader. And I will be employing longer time-stamps, hardly will I be doing day-by-day. Don't know, just felt like I needed to throw that out there. Love you all. Take care.


	3. Are You Willing?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You hardly ever get answers when you want them, and typically when you get the answers you so desperately wanted, you find that they don't satisfy. He says he'll never ask more than you're capable of. He didn't say anything about will.  
> But...what is it that you carry like a mantra?  
> You don't have to like it. You just have to be willing.  
> Turns out there is something you're not willing to do. Well...two things. Forgive Dean and give up this book. Too bad there's something else that wants it. Something you can't run from.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lord Almighty it's been too long. And I actually have a valid excuse: I'm in the process of moving. So, I don't who lives in the U.S. or more accurately who lives in Ohio- but anyway. We've gotten tons of rain, and a lot of flooding to go with it. In short, all this rain and flooding has turned my house into the Titanic, so off my mother and I go to find another place to live before we drown in our own house. I had a few minutes today to write something, and this is the product. Sorry about the crazy wait, friends.

April 24th

You drag your forearm across your cheeks, swipe at your forehead and all the dampness gathered there. It's fairly early in the morning, still in low numbers but the sun is already harsh and unforgiving. It makes you wish for sunscreen, you know you're going to get sunburned out here today.

Even with the trees flanking you on both sides of this dirt road in the country. If you had to guess you're headed towards a development of houses: the fields of used-to-be crops are starting to thin out, revealing over grown plains and hills of grass and brome.

You had asked where you were, where Castiel had zapped you to, but he only said "West." Well, alrighty then. Still, you can't complain about putting SC behind you. It would be nice to know what state you're in though, just for the Hell of it.

The air feels dry, dryer than SC but the sun is stronger, the sky clearer. And it seems so much bigger for some reason. You take a floppy sleeve of your jacket tied around your waist and wipe your face again. You're sweating bullets, but you aren't tired or thirsty. You guess that's part of being inhuman.

Conversation between you and Castiel has been short and sweet. And not for lack of trying, on multiple occasions you've started a conversation only for it to drop to nil. You wonder if he's angry with you, though what for you have no idea. So you've let the silence rest in the space between you, unsure what else to do with it.

But you don't know that Castiel's just worried, anxious. About that event a few days ago that forced him to wing the both of you to the dead center of the western U.S. He can think only of one thing at the cause, given the location, and your nearness of when that 'phenomenon' took place.

The Sentinels are coming after you.

He's never met them. Luckily.

No one has. Not for a few thousand years. Their presence and influence hasn't been needed. Until now.

Until you.

If they catch up to you, Castiel will be powerless to stop them. Which means he either has to keep the two of you on the move, or you have to tap into the latent power inside you, buried deep in your soul. The second option is a long-shot in the dark and may be more dangerous than it's worth. So the only option is to keep ahead of them.

In more than one way.

He might have a plan. But, like most things nowadays, it won't be easy. He needs to take you to the angel that foresaw, and explained all of this to himself and the Winchesters before the apocalypse started.

He might be able to help you, either to safely guide you through the process of gaining control of what is within you, or at the very least, to explain to you what exactly is needed from you in order to end all of this.

All he knows for certain is that if the Sentinels reach you before you can make it to this angel, you will be dead, along with him, and the apocalypse won't end. This will be the state of the world forever more. And if that isn't enough, Crowley is out here somewhere, looking for you. Those cultists want you, most likely.

And you're going on a mini-vacation as if the entire planet isn't on a desperate mission to seize you.

Castiel is starting to feel overwhelmed.

"Hey, I know you're like, taking an unexplained vow of silence, but-"

Castiel listens to you speak, as he's done every time you've opened your mouth for the past few days.

You whip the book out of your bag and flip through the pages. "What does all this mean? Because I can't read a lick of it." You frown at the symbols and runes, an itching sensation behind your forehead, right between your eyes as if something inside is stirred at the sight of this nonsense in front of you.

"You wish to know more about yourself? About all of this?" Castiel asks, head cocked as he keeps pace with you and the conversation.

You shrug. "Yeah, might as well. I don't have anything better to do." You rub at your forehead, snap the book shut. "So, do you have any clue?" You wave the book at him in question.

How convenient, he muses. That he desires to get you to the angel that knows everything- _everything -_ about you, and you wish to know more. Fate couldn't have done a better job.

"No," he shakes his head, lets you frown in disappointment, and then adds, slowly. "But I do know one that could tell you more."

You squint suspiciously. "Before I get my hopes up, do you know if this person is alive?"

"No." he answers outright, and you throw your hands up in the air with a groan. "But it isn't as if you've anything to lose."

You sigh, shove the book back in your bag and silently agree with him. "Alright, so who are we setting off to see?" you wonder aloud, spreading your arms wide with wiggling fingertips in sarcastic enthusiasm.

"He is an angel. Older than mankind, created in the very beginning before time itself was real."

Oh. You stop briefly to appreciate that, the archaic and profoundness of this being that you're headed towards. It seems a bit macabre that an angel that old and important would be stuck on earth in the end days.

"O-ok." You say, scratching at your jaw. You think a bug might have bitten you. "Does this angel have a name?"

Of course he has a name. What a strange question. "Raziel. He is the Keeper of Secrets."

"Keeper of Secrets, huh? So, what? Am I the most kept secret in Heaven?"

"Since the Fall of Man...yes." Castiel responds and strides past you after you stop cold in the middle of the road.

Second only to the Forbidden Fruit that was responsible for casting man out of Heaven. Well, that isn't the kind of news you were expecting today. He could have tried to sprinkle some sugar on top of this bitter meal.

Shaking your head, you jog after him, bag slapping your thigh and throw out another question. "Do you know where he is?"

Castiel peers at you side-long. " I have a general idea."

You stare at him flatly, _are you serious?_ absolutely oozing from you. "Right..." You trail off, and grab a bottle of water from a side pocket of your bag. You get the cap screwed off when something occurs to you. Something days late.

"Why would he help me? Help us?" And then you ask a question far over-due. "Why are _you_ helping me?"

Castiel is quiet for a long time as he ponders a simple but effective way to answer your question. The one he deems the most important to you anyway. "Because I can see past circumstance."

You blink at him, swat a nosy fly out of your face and nod like you understand his stance and his very vague reason.

"Which brings me to a very difficult request of you."

You reach back and tighten your pony-tail, wait for him to continue, trying to brace yourself for whatever it is he's hesitating about. Must be something serious.

Shadows shift and the sun moves fractions of inches in the sky above your head as he ponders his wording, as he cautiously approaches this conversation and prepares for the back-lash, prepares for your response. Perspiration beads along the bridge of your nose, collects under your eyes like tiny reservoirs and you wipe it away with all the irritation and brashness of a young child.

He is unaffected, untouched by the heat and discomfort, by the many miles you've both walked. He is immune to the passage of time and the problems that come with it: fatigue, aching muscles, pressure on the mind, a gnawing stomach, irritability. He's more-so immune to the thing itself: time. Because he is in no hurry to speak, he's chewing his words many times over, careful of their weight and flavor, wary to start a fire.

You can take the silence of conversation in the night when the crickets chirp and coyotes yip, when the air is damp with chill and the wind blows faintly, ghostly dark grey forms floating in front of a pristine glowing moon. You can take the silence then. But not in the light of day when everything is clear and sharper and harsh, when the heat bears down on you, oppressive and unrelenting, when sweat rolls down your neck and slicks your collar-bone, when the horizon is unbroken and vast and it's easy to see how far you've left to go.

Your patience is worn thin, chopped away in inches as if restrained below the swing of a pendulum. "What is this difficult request?"

He can sense your eyes on him, boring into the side of his face with rapt interest and obvious impatience. He glances at you, the openness of your expression, the threadbare willingness to hear and listen to anything he might say. The fact that you value his word, his opinions, that you enjoy his company however socially inept he may be- well, it makes him happy to say the least. Which is why he's so hesitant to answer.

But there's no forestalling this. He must ask.

He stops walking, and turns to regard you thoughtfully. "Y/N," the way he says your name puts you on edge, creates a ball in the pit of your stomach. His request isn't going to be something good.

You swallow thickly, and nod as a que to show you're listening, to encourage him to continue. Seeing how reluctant he is makes you wary, but somehow it reinforces the comradery you feel around him. It must be the genuine worry and care for your well-being that he exhibits. In no time at all, he earned your trust, perhaps even your friendship if you're being transparent. He had stuck by you in a time of sickness and unknown adversity. Without question. Even when you threw the brunt of your anger at him he refused to leave you. He had no reason other than guilt to be where he was. At first. Now what is his reason?

Is it loyalty? Is he loyal to you? Are you friends? Or are you just two survivors mutually benefitting from the other's continuing existence?

"Y/N. Forgive him."

His request falls on your ears like a thousand buzzing bees, a mess and deafening but distinct in its composition. You hear the words as a whole, in a heap of sounds as if he's spoken a foreign language to you. Time slips by as the buzzing in your head turns to ringing, as the meaning sinks in. A meaning you don't want to acknowledge.

"Forgive who?" you ask, thinking the question to be a hurdle, but really it's just a slip-knot for this conversation.

Castiel softens his gaze as yours hardens, your expression cinching into something rigid and cold as you tip-toe around the hard reality of this moment. Of course you're bricking up your emotions, hiding the fragility that comes with this territory, with the mention of a very specific human.

"Forgive Dean, Y/N."

Your response isn't immediate, it isn't even minutely. Castiel watches a war wage within you, a very real war between the you that was before the apocalypse and the you in front of him. It gives him hope that it takes you so long to come to a decision, to say something, to contemplate and think about this outlandish request.

"Why?" you ask him, voice monotone and steady. It's an effort to shut up something deep inside you that twists and turns and prickles like hot barb-wire, something that doesn't feel quite like _you._ It's a distinct color, a bitter flavor, and an acid strength. It's wild and mean, and vicious with teeth and claws for bloody tearing. It's the tang of iron and death, the roar of a fire and the firm pull of a riptide.

It isn't you: this strange thing that bubbles in your chest like boiling oil. You know it isn't. But you're content to let it steer the wheel.

"Because you can." He says, matter of fact, simple. As if you've asked what color the sky is.

You cross your arms over your chest, eyes narrowing to mere slits at his proclamation. His vote of confidence and faith in your good-will. If only you were as unaffected by time and its cohorts as he is.

**No.**

It howls inside you like a war cry, indignant and wrathful with a sheen of judgement colored black that makes your conscience clear.

"He doesn't deserve it." You tell him, the words shooting off your tongue like poisoned bullets, as if the man himself is here in front of you to face your retribution.

Castiel takes your stance in stride, his expression remaining the same cut of sorry. "All the more reason." He replies, lips quirking at the corners sardonically, sagely, and you falter in your rage at the gentle advice, the soft understanding in his deep blues. "I will never ask more of you than you are capable of doing, Y/N."

He accompanies the words with a hand placed onto one of your stiff shoulders in a manner he's seen done a thousand times. It's a gesture of reassurance, of compassion, concern, a quiet reminder to the recipient that there's a helping hand when needed.

"If i's too soon for Dean, then forgive Sam first."

**No. How about we don't forgive either of them, hm? There's guilt of commission, and guilt of omission. Dean = commission. Sam = omission.**

It's there again, stronger. More prominent and rising like the tide against the shore with a coming storm.

You don't like the conflicting way the inside and outside work. Inside, you want nothing more than the both of them to end up dead. Outside, Castiel waits with expectancy and high hopes, with faith and trust in your ability to forgive and do the right thing. It makes you sick to your stomach, and you can't take another second of his soul-searching ocean blues waiting for you to make the right choice.

So, you settle for middle ground. "I will try."

Castiel smiles, crinkles faintly appearing around the corners of his eyes. "You will succeed." He tells you firmly with a small shake to your shoulder.

You need a change of topic. You toss him a wan smile and the two of you continue walking, Castiel lighter in spirits. He must have been carrying that around for a while. You wonder just how long he's been with the brothers, how much the three of them have been through together for him to rally and plead forgiveness on their behalf.

"Can I ask something?" You say, figuring the door of conversation has been properly opened to let the sitting room air out.

"Of course."

How can he be so ready? Maybe nothing phases him? Perhaps he's heard it all and nothing is new to him. Incapable of being surprised and thrown off balance. You wish you had that kind of self-assurance.

"A few days ago when you flew us away from that strange phenomenon...we ended up in a graveyard."

Castiel nods, blue eyes fixated on the vanishing point of the road hundreds of feet ahead. "I don't believe that was a question." He muses, sounding serious. Though it could just be the sand-paper wrapped gravel tone of his voice working against him.

"There was this tombstone," You continue, scratching at a cheek with your index finger, mouth tugged down in a half-hearted frown. "It had Dean's name on it."

"Are you going to ask your question, or are you just going play for time, Y/N?" Castiel asks, sliding his hands into his trench coat pockets. You've picked up on that, finally. This tick, this tell of his.

"Was he...did he...die?" It sounds insane for the question to leave your mouth, but what else is there to ask? It can't be some mix-up. It was his name on the tombstone, and the date of birth was most likely correct. With all the love for classic rock and the old movies he reminisces about as well actors you've never heard of the date had to be correct. And it couldn't be coincidence: Castiel who knows a Dean Winchester who just happens to zap the two of you to a graveyard where a tombstone-

See the point? No further analyzing needed. Except...if Dean _had_ died how exactly was he here?

"Yes." Is Castiel's curt reply. You've apparently hit a vein.

Well, too bad. If he can ask you to forgive both the Winchesters, he can divulge some information. It's a trade you can live with. It's a trade that you're actually losing ground on, but...you can live with that too.

"Fair enough." He sighs, relenting. You're not even upset that he listened in on your thoughts. Might make things more convenient.

"How did he die?" is the first question on the tip of your tongue, point A in your line of questioning down the alphabet. There's no wonder about why, the why is irrelevant. In a sense. If you learned that he did something to warrant death it would reinforce your stance against him. But on the off-chance that he died a guiltless man, died an unfair death with clean hands...you aren't ready for the ethical dilemma that will cause.

"He was torn apart."

You blink dumbly, mouth dropping open at Castiel's factual response. The way he just says things as if no consequence will come from them.

"Torn apart? By what?" you ask, curious and somewhat wary. It feels like there's a rabbit hole you might fall into somewhere, but you can't see it. So unlike Alice: you look for it, so you may not tumble into the dark depths, but avoid them.

"Hellhounds."

You rock back on your heels, stunned to a screeching halt. You aren't sure exactly what it is he's talking about, but the mere mention of Hell shoves everything behind an opaque curtain and cloaks it blurry mystery with milky shadows and sinister motive.

Hell. Hounds.

Hellhounds.

"What are those" you utter, not sure you want to know but helpless against the domineering curiosity about things behind doors and shutters and padlocks. Goosebumps skate along your arms despite the heat biting at your skin.

"Exactly what they sound like, Y/N." He talks over his shoulder, a third of his profile visible around the cut of his collar. He closes his eyes as if in need of rest, and hears you swallow thickly. Your eyes aren't innocent, your hands aren't clean, but your soul fights to stay pure in the hollow of your ribcage.

He remembers his promise to you: that he would always tell you the truth. In the beginning, he was naïve enough to think he could break that promise, fresh out of a situation where his trust in others was heavily tested. He thought he could play both sides with a clean conscience. Lie to you here and there about a few things to keep you in his good graces.

Now, now he cares more about your faith in him than he does his own standing among the Winchesters. He doesn't want to betray you. Will he tell you everything of his own volition? No. But he will give up the bearings if you ask.

"They hunt down people who have made contracts with demons- sold their souls -and when their time is up the hellhounds kill them and drag their soul to Hell."

A sharp intake of breath from you has him opening his eyes to the bright sunshine glinting off stalks of dead barnyard grass and brome, looking almost like wheat in their color. You release that breath shakily, disbelief wavering the air from your lungs.

So Dean made a contract with a demon, and then he died, and his soul went to Hell. Ok, ok. Okey-dokey. Yup.

"Why did he sell his soul?"

Castiel smiles. You're finally getting to the meat of this interrogation and he's relieved. Because he has an answer that might shift the harsh angle of light on Dean that you've been using to scrutinize him with.

He turns, faces you head-on with an expression a judge might wear when giving a death sentence. "He sold his soul to save Sam's life." He watches your eyes widen in shock. He can't blame you. You hardly know Dean. The few weeks you spent with both Winchesters was not enough time to learn about the two of them in great detail. You don't know the strength of the bond between the Winchester brothers.

All you know is Dean: Apocalypse survivor extraordinaire. A cold heartless man with unforgiving justice and no moral compass. You don't actually know how selfless he is, how compassionate. Though now perhaps you have a marginally better idea.

You close your eyes with a grimace and shake your head, you've a terrible visual of Dean's death in your mind, and everything after. A million flashes of what you think Hell might be like, and you want to know-

"How long was he there?"

Is that sympathy in your voice, regret? Fear? Pity? You don't know. You don't know.

"Four months."

Four months in Hell. Dean was in Hell for four months.

No wonder he is the way he is. But...

"How did he come back?" you ask, gaze on the asphalt because you can't bear to let Castiel see that this information is affecting you. Rocking your boat.

"I saved him." He says, pride in his voice, not an ounce of regret. There's something melancholy hanging in the air between his few words though, and you don't know it's because he understands that _you don't understand._ You don't understand why someone like Castiel would save someone like Dean.

Why didn't Dean stay in Hell? What made him so special and exempt to the rules? Why did he go free?

You frown so hard your eyebrows ache.

"Why?" You hiss, and glance up.

Castiel twitches a smile, one high on amusement and a lack of sympathy. It's a very patient smile of sage-like proportions. "Because I can see past circumstance."

You don't know what he means. What circumstance?

"We should continue," Castiel muses with his head cocked. When you don't answer or respond in any way he turns on his heel. "Finding Raziel will not be easy, we can't waste time."

You stare at his back and listen to his quiet footsteps of a steady rhythm. You mock salute, "Aye-aye, sir." You mutter under your breath, tired mentally. That's one kind of exhaustion you aren't spared.

**All this "we" talk. But who's calling the shots? And whose side is he really on? You're evil personified and he's an angel. He should be trying to kill you, not make friends and 'help you'. He's definitely got an ulterior motive hidden in that trench-coat. Don't trust him.**

**For all you know, Y/N, he could be leading you into a trap. And how do you know he isn't still loyal to the Winchesters? To Dean? Seems there isn't anything Castiel wouldn't be willing to do for Dean.**

**Keep your friends close...**

"Y/N, are you coming?" Castiel calls from further ahead, curious and confused like a puppy.

It's a second before his words register past the fog of your mind, and the world refocuses through the haze of your zoned-out gaze.

You shake your head vigorously, tossing off the cement-heavy feeling of your skull. "Yeah!" you yell, and jog after him. But you don't look at him, instead you fix your eyes on the horizon, something that can't notice a change in your behavior, or the guarded look in your orbs, the pinch of your brows in confusion.

The disconcertion in your mind pricks at you. This strange advice from a voice that is not your own. And you find there's some logic in this disembodied council, which worries you. Because the thoughts had never crossed your mind before. There had never been any doubt about Castiel's motives, about his loyalty to you.

But maybe you should've questioned him along the way? Maybe you're too trusting. Too forgiving and soft with people.

You glance at him...

He's care-free, his walk loose and relaxed and his eyes are light with peace and comfort. There's no indication of something sinister behind his appearance. He's the same today as he was a few days ago when he bared his soul to your judgement, when he nursed you back to health without a clue. He hasn't changed.

Has he?

You slip your hand into your bag, fingers rubbing at the spine of the book, feeling the dip in the leather that is the unknown title. It comforts you a fraction, its familiarity a balm under the onslaught of all the unknown getting tossed at you. This at least makes sense, this is something that is exactly where it belongs.

**Right where it belongs. In your hands. Yours. No one else's.**

Your eyes narrow an inch as your grip on the spine forms, possessiveness affirmed with this inward proclamation. Nothing has ever sounded so right in your eyes.

You bob your head in agreement, stroke a thumb along the edge of the spine.

_Mine,_ you think. You cut your gaze at Castiel who's unconcerned about you, you can survive practically anything. And he's ready to whisk the both of you away at a moment's notice of danger anyway.

_Mine._

You almost scowl at the thought that he probably wouldn't have any problem taking the book from you.

_Mine._ You won't let anyone take it.

_Mine..._ it's a fading declaration but firm in its meaning and its decision. And you feel certain about it, feel confident, zeroed-in and focused on this goal of keeping the book within your possession.

But then-

**Mine.**

You blink in subdued shock, in disorientation. Yours was a quiet murmur, a promise to yourself. But this, this was a growl of fiery embers and pluming smoke.

It settles in your chest like a lead weight, burning coursing lava through your veins.

You feel...powerful.

But scared. It's a force driving the wheel of your thoughts, and at the helm is sheer fire, dangerous and wrathful and destructive. It feels like it could tear you apart from the inside out, this malevolent pulse of heat and gnashing venom that weaves its way throughout your system like snakes in tunnels.

You don't feel in control. Not of yourself. Not of anything.

**Mine, Y/N. Mine.**

You snatch your hand away from the book, your fingernails having dug into the leather and as soon as you lose physical contact with it you feel better. The haze is gone, the crushing presence at the back of your mind is lifted like a canopy, your emotions die down to nothing, and suddenly it's all replaced with fatigue.

You shoot your eyes toward Castiel, wondering if he noticed anything about you. But he's unchanged, still just as oblivious. What if you imagined all of it? Castiel could read your mind, he had a habit of it. Surely, he would've noticed the different voice in your head, the conversation that occurred just a moment ago.

Curious, skeptical, you inch your hand back into your bag, and gently skim your fingers along the leather.

The response is immediate and loud inside your head.

**Mine. Y/N.**

Wholly mortified, you remove your hand and clench it into a fist to stop its shaking. For the next few miles you keep both hands out of your bag, and lock your eyes straight ahead...and ignore the mean throb in the center of your chest. You keep your mouth shut, more because you feel like you'll throw up rather than the fact that you have no idea what to say.

Behind the two of you storm clouds roll and tumble in the sky, distant rumbles of thunder growling out from them. It's nothing compared to the growl resonating inside you, one you can't forget, one imprinted into your ear-drums.

Inhuman...

And inside you.

Without a word, you take off running towards the horizon, ignoring Castiel's confused call of your name.

**Run, Y/N. Run from me if you can.**

You don't stop. Not until Castiel catches up to you an odd number of miles later after waiting for you to stop running. He wants to ask why you're on your hands and knees heaving and gagging in the middle of the road, but he doesn't get the chance.

One second you're there in front of him, the next you're gone. Completely vanished from his sight.

He does a one eighty, ocean blues wide as he searches for you. Hoping that you didn't go far, hoping that in your strained state you might've just teleported a few hundred feet. But there's no sign of you in the field or on the road.

And for some reason he can't sense your soul. He should be able to find you wherever you are on this planet. It shouldn't matter if you were on another continent, he'd find you. But...there's nothing. You're just gone.

He sighs, spins again with the pointless hope that he just missed you, glanced over you. But he knows.

He frowns, loosely curls and uncurls his hands into fists while his mind runs wild with theories, and worst-case scenarios. Most of which result in you ending up dead.

"Perfect." He mutters, at a loss of what to do. But he does the only thing he can think of, the only thing he has.

He pulls out his phone and dials Sam. It'll be easier to give the news to the level-headed, logical, reasonable Winchester.

It rings hardly a second before it's picked up and Sam talks. "Cas, is everything alright?"

Then angel hesitates, reluctant to relay information. But what else is there? Sam needs to know, so does Dean now that this has happened.

"She's disappeared." Castiel reports, and continues on before Sam can interrupt with a question. "The seal on her soul is weakening." Castiel scolds himself for handing the book over to you. He didn't know the affects would take hold so quickly. He hoped to reach Raziel first and let the angel ease you into your abilities.

Regardless, he needs to find you. Soon. He needs to get that book away from you, at least until you both reach Raziel. The longer you're out there, alone, with the book is only going to make things worse for you. And for others. People you have grudges against...they're in danger.

"I'm going to try and find her. In the meantime, you and Dean should use the wards Raziel gave to you...do you still have them?" he thinks to ask simply because it's been three years, and so much has happened since then.

"Yeah..." Sam mutters, and Castiel hears a door creak shut on rusty hinges from Sam's end of the line. "You really think she'd come after-...us?"

Us. That's very Sam. To take responsibility for something that isn't his fault, to walk into the line of fire like some sacrifice whose death will save millions.

"Yes." Is all Castiel says. He doesn't have the time for a drawn-out conversation, and if he's being honest, he's not in the mood to talk to Sam. He's worried about you. "We're in Kansas, Sam. Or at least I am. I have no idea where she is now."

He hangs up and takes off, no destination in mind as he looks for you among the clouds. He's flying blind. And time isn't on his side.

 


	4. Window Panes and Playing Boards

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone wants something: basic human fact. We could write a list of all the things you want, all the things the people around you want, we could analyze each of those things and rationalize them. But what about the inhuman beings around you? What do they want? Does wanting something make you human? Make you selfish? Or does it just confirm that you're alive? Windows divide, but provide a false sense of clarity and connection. Much like the window between your mind, and your soul.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How long has it been? What year is it!? Still 2017? Alright, I'm not a COMPLETE a-hole then. But I am still an ass. So, I took an unintentional and unwanted hiatus. I was without internet for 2(?)...3(?) months, which means I had no way of updating my stories. And then my Microsoft office subscription expired so I had no way to write (both of these things were going on at the same time by the way). Yeah- so, I could apologize, but both of these things were out of my control. Just felt like I owed you all an explanation. And this chapter is supposed to be confusing, I am purposefully leaving you all in the dark, in the middle of the ocean, during a storm, without a life ring. Happy reading!

April ??th Â Location: ???

 

The water is still. Calm. Untouched. And it reflects nothing regardless of the trees and flowers surrounding it, and the person sitting at the edge of it.

The colorless water is part of a copse, tucked away in some unknown corner of the world, hidden from mortal eyes and celestial alike. Only those invited by its host can find it, no matter if they were standing at the entrance; unless they were ushered in by its sole resident, they'd never set foot inside.

Striking amethyst orbs lazily open, sand-colored eyelashes fluttering with the motion.

Overhead, from a ragged cut in the ceiling of stone, something flutters in carried on milky waves of light and dust, sparkling and blinding white. Sounds can be heard from within the shadowed depths of the copse: the beating of wings, the chitter of birds, animals running through underbrush, insects buzzing, a symphony of life playing for an audience of one.

His ears are buried underneath a hood of grey silk, and his cream tinted hair spills out down his collar-bone, framing his jaw in slightly curled tendrils. His purple eyes maintain their stare on the water, knowledgeable about everything going on around him without so much as flitting his gaze.

He's felt a shift in the air, in the atmosphere, so he waits.

For three years he's watched the landscape change and alter. Watched the balance tip this way and that, sometimes for the good, sometimes for the bad. It's about time for the scales to shift again.

A slow blink, and he looks up with a hand elegantly raised. It falls into his waiting palm with a series of graceful twists, tiny threads of downy dispersing from it.

For a few seconds he merely regards it, neutral and unfeeling. It wouldn't be the first time one of them has fallen into his shaded copse, certainly it won't be the last.

_Castiel._

He recognizes the owner of the feather from a simple touch, it's blackened and a smidge brittle from the Fire. He twirls the foot-long midnight feather between his index and thumb, idly thinking, musing and reminiscing, and determining the fallen angel's worth.

He feels an anxiousness tied into this piece of Castiel- a worry, a truly genuine type of concern. And a desperation.

With a slight tilt of his head, he lays the feather off to the side on the bank of the water, inches from the break of the pond, and resumes his former state.

Eyes closed and hands in his lap, he tarries not in thought for the angel. Castiel will be fine. It's you he needs to get here, quickly. And he's already sent an escort for you, hopefully you will arrive.

Dogs always find their way home in the end, right?

A tiny quirk to his lips, he adjusts the bandana at the edge of the pond, inching it further into the water.

An entire world on fire and he's playing tag using a dog.

Shaking his head, he tucks his chin to his chest and exhales a slow breath.

Patience perfectly in place, Raziel listens for you...for the _both of you_ now that the seal is weakened. You are in distress, that much is obvious. You are lost, and scared, confused. And you are alone.

In a manner of speaking.

He isn't keen on seeing...the other part of you. It's been so long, but Raziel doubts that the other half of you would have lessened his grudge after all these years. No, the grudge has most likely just gotten stronger.

It will be interesting to look after you. Difficult, but interesting.

That's alright though. He lives for interesting.

 

Day ??? Time: ???

 

The fondest memory I have is not my own, and shockingly enough it isn't something drenched in blood or echoing with the screams of innocents. It's something much simpler and dare I say it- pure. Ironic, I know.

You wouldn't know, Y/N. You weren't alive then in the way you are now. In truth, you weren't even the same person.

You see, this memory takes place in the early 80s. And you in this period of time were a young adolescent boy. Please, remain in your seat, stay calm, and let me tell you a little about this time, this person you were, and who I was in regards to you.

 

It's much like looking through a fogged-up mirror being where I am. I can make vague distinctions, such as the brightness of a room, or how big something is. Sometimes I can recognize emotions...sometimes those emotions make their way _to me_.

But I'm never able to wipe away the condensation, or open the window. I'm forced to stand on the other side and squint through this metaphorical pane like an old man reads the newspaper. There are a few instances in which this window isn't even there.

It's rare. Only happened twice in the last 2 thousand years.

Rare because the life-span of these windows that sit on these houses are so short.

Anyway...

The early 80s. And a young adolescent boy by the name of Jasper Hemingway. No, really. I.m not making it up.

Jasper was in no way a fortunate kid. His parents were poor, worked hard jobs and barely saw him. He wore clothes until he out-grew them, never had anything new. Most everything he had he got from second-hand shops or yard sales.

But he- like you -was pure. Pure of heart and soul.

Now don't try to deny it, Y/N. You may not know me, but I. Know. You.

Jasper. He was an extraordinary bird, and at first I wanted nothing but to destroy him. I hated him just like I hated everyone else I've ever been forced to...co-exist with. I wanted him dead. He was pathetic, and pitiable, and he just disgusted me, Y/N.

Let me tell you- in the thousands of years since this cycle of mine began I've hardly ever tried to whittle away at the seal. But him...him I made an effort for.

It's impossible to break this seal given the time I have to work with. But I tried for this soul. Jasper Hemingway. I would shatter the wall between us like I have with you, and I would pulverize him into the dust from which he came.

He had no idea I was there. None of them ever do until near the end, of course by then it's only a feeling. Some kind of shudder wrapped around the spine like black ribbon for you all.

Â But I fought and fought and pushed until I cracked it.

And he knew. I knew the moment he did, and the horror he felt- the _fear..._ it's like a drug for me. I had my fun for months, watching him slip away bit by bit, wasting away into nothing under the constant barrage of my voice and my hounding.

Until one day, I just stopped having an effect. He learned on his own how to block me, how to separate us from each other. I was trapped on the outside looking in rather than the other way around, but I was still trapped.

Something happened to Jasper when he learned of me.

His life began to change.

He tried harder in everything he did, never quit anything until it was finished. He became charitable, and courageous, selfless. And he smiled.

Not fleeting smiles, and not smiles because someone told a good joke. He smiled all the time because he was happy.

I'm not sure why it happened the way it did. But being there, stopped from entering- having to watch his life improve, his health and outlook skyrocket. Watching everything fall into place for this kid of 9 and not be able to feel anything or hear anything...it was some kind of torture for me.

Jasper was living in a seal-tight glass box, everything going in his life I could see but not experience with him as I had before. This small area was reserved for Jasper, for the accomplishments and adventures, the happiness...and I felt nothing.

For the first time in a very long time I had felt nothing.

And I wanted to feel something.

I wanted to feel what Jasper felt.

It grew to such strength, this desire to experience life- Jasper's life -that he eventually sensed me again. Just on the outskirts of his mind and his soul, I was moping like a dog left out on a porch in the cold. He didn't ignore me, instead he acknowledged me. Not with fear, but cautionary contemplation.

Long story short, he invited me back on one condition: no more hostility from me. Peaceful co-existence.

Voluntary. He was voluntarily allowing my existence. Coinciding together. Not a decree or an order. This was a choice. His choice.

I accepted with a healthy amount of skepticism.

He still irritated me sometimes, but most of the time not.

Jasper made a couple of friends, a couple good ones that stick with you through thick and thin and I was glad for him. His emotions fed into my own and soon I began to think of them as my friends too. Age is nothing to me, young people I am accustomed to, more so than adults for a very obvious reason...that I will not divulge to you.

I'm not going to be your lighthouse in this mess, Y/N. Know that now. I am not your ally. I want to make that very clear. Anyway-

Jasper and I became as close as two 'people' can be without being the same person. I invested myself in his company and his well-being, lending advice and in some cases my power: Jasper was bullied quite regularly at his school.

He was a bright child with a passion for academics and things of 'nerdy nature'. For a while he asked me not to worry, to leave it be. And I listened. Until one day I couldn't any longer. I didn't have the permission, in fact I was explicitly asked not to do anything.

But if I had listened Jasper would have ended up in the hospital.

Instead I sent them to the hospital. I think one of them died. Not sure, I can't remember anymore.

I saw Jasper through elementary school, and middle school and forgot what was coming. What always happens without fail. It was on a strict schedule. Divine appointment. No joke.

But if I say any more about this arrangement, this seal and all its dirty details I may give you a migraine. I'll leave that to the angel.

It was his birthday. And rather than some large affair he only wanted to go eat pizza at the local hang-out. The usual spot for himself and his friends. They took the corner booth in the beginning of every night, in a place that they could watch the entire diner.

The floors were checkered black and white and so clean that reflections looked like alternate realities. An upside-down universe. The bar was long and stretched almost from one end of the room to the next, metal-lipped and shiny with teal colored bar-stools dotted at its length on swiveling poles. Neon lights sliced the ceiling into sections behind the bar, and some took places at booths on the walls that weren't occupied with ancient pictures of the town.

Synth-pop- arguably the defining sound of the 80s -continually rolled from the speakers nestled into the ceiling corners of the diner. By the time night came sneaking in, the owner turned off the radio and Jasper would mosey over to the jukebox near the cash register and keep the music going. Sometimes he'd put five dollars in and choose random songs just to keep the mood in the same state.

But by that time, himself, Luke, and Miles would be sitting at the bar drinking half-priced milkshakes and laughing about whatever, joking and gossiping like young boys do. I always felt happy when they went to the diner and spent time together. It was art in motion. It made me feel like things happened _for_ people and not _to_ them.

They made me forget that time moves. Their trio was so perfectly fitted together it seemed holy and untouchable.

That night ran long, not that the owner minded. On more than one occasion he had left the diner with the boys still inside. They were his most faithful customers, and once of age they all planned to work for him. Jasper was the one with the key to the diner for locking up on the nights that they stayed after closing.

Pm ran into am before Luke and Miles headed home on their bicycles, their headlights cutting into the dark like a sword-lunge. The diner sign glowed and blinked and buzzed, like hellos and goodbyes all at once out in the gravel parking lot.

Jasper always watched them go from his perch on the middle barstool. I was ready for him to move on like he did when he couldn't see them anymore, but that night he didn't. That night he waited until everything calmed and stood still, and then he talked to me.

But I can't call it _talking_ per se. We never spoke words to one another with our mouths.

I could give you the long-winded version, but you're just not worthy of hearing his last words verbatim.

In a nutshell: It may look like to others that there's always been three of us on these barstools and in these booths, but it's really always been four.

You may be wondering why I'm telling you all of this. Well, it isn't to garner sympathy or to try and deceive you into thinking I'm something docile because I'm not. What this is, is a warning. Don't think you can get near me like Jasper.

You and I are not two halves of the same coin. If you let your guard down around me, Y/N, I will chew you up and spit you out.

Listen to me.

I don't want you to give up. I want you to fight me. Fight me with everything so that when I win I can venerate my victory like a golden statue. I don't want _easy_ from you.

This is the first time- the very first time -that the seal has weakened on its own due to time and I want to make the most of it. I waited so long for this freedom at hand that it needs to be worthy. So don't disappoint me or I may just tear you apart from the inside just to teach you a little something.

"That's all for now. You should wake up, Y/N. Any longer and you risk never waking up again."

...

"Don't toy with me, human."

...

"You can't be dying already. We haven't met face-to-face. You haven't even said a word to me, Y/N."

...

"Hm. I'm not surprised you couldn't save Jace. You're pathetic."

"...Fuck...you."

"Open your eyes, mortal, and I shall release you."

"From what?"                                                                                  "Where am I?"

                     "Who are you?"                                                                                                      "What happened?"

_"_ _Open your eyes."_ A new voice. Young. Soft-spoken, kindly.

 

 

_"_ _It's strange. I would have thought by now that he'd understand."_ A flash of a smile, apologetic, powder blue eyes. _"_ _You're going to have to change his mind, Y/N."_

"Whose mind?"

You can feel a smile being sent your way, amused.

_"_ _Open your eyes. You need to find your way back."_

"My...way back?"

...

_Tap. Tap. T-t-t-tap. T-t-t-t-tap. TAP._

Peeling your eyelids back feels like tearing duct tape off a wound but you do it, only to be confounded. You can barely see it's so dark with shadows clinging to shapes and objects and corners. They quiver and shift like they're cold, they vibrate minutely as if in repulsion.

The floor is frigid, and the world is on its side. Flames flicker here and there like afterthoughts, struggling to be cohesive and constant. Candles. They're candles. Scented.

But they don't smell good.

It's blood, and gasoline, rotted plants and soggy earth, mildewed wood.

Two gleaming pinpoints in the dark are trained on you, the glint of flame on eyes. Someone's in here. Wherever you are. They don't move, even when you swipe your hand along the floor.

Cold, smooth. A wall at your back. Also cold and smooth.

Fingers trail, find softness. Fabric.

Blankets. Pillows.

The meat locker, you realize. You're back in the meat locker.

But everything's different. The candles don't offer any light and it's so much colder than you remember. The space feels bigger, and this person-

You don't know them. You can't see them where they sit at a table, close to a multitude of melting candles. The tapping. I's them tapping their fingers impatiently on the wood. Impatient for what?

"You're just the cutest damned thing when you're confused, kiddo."

You freeze solid. You know that voice. Couldn't forget it if you tried.

"Tried to set the mood for us," He says, feigning disappointment in himself. You hear the chair he's in creak as he stands. "But it doesn't look like the candles did much." His boots thump loudly. Like the gavel of a judge after passing a life-sentence.

"Ah well," He sighs, and you imagine he pouts at you, putting on the theatrics. He likes to do that. He's at the edge now, close to breaching your comfort zone. "Least we have blankets and pillows this time, huh?"

He chuckles. That same sinister note to it the first time you heard it. The beginning of your fear, this sound was the pair of scissors that cut the ceremonial ribbon on it.

"If I had fucked you against that desk like I wanted to I don't think you or it would have lasted."

You think you remember the layout of the locker, specifically where the meat hooks hang. You need to get out of here.

"What are you doing here?" you ask. But you don't even know where 'here' is. Really, you're just hoping he'll give up some kind of information.

"Making up for our first date. I don't really think it went that well,"

Jesus Christ. You squint into the darkness at the end of your make-shift bed, remembering the revolver. Everything else is the same so why wouldn't it be there?

"And that's my fault. I didn't give you any choices, kid." Oh, there's a smile in his voice. You can hear it. Before you can react, a large hand snaps around your wrist, strong and unyielding. He yanks you to your feet with such force you crash into him, his scent washing over you in nauseating waves.

A sturdy arm wraps around your back, keeping you pressed into him and his other hand pets at your hair, fingers stroke your cheek and jaw deceitfully sweet, and he talks. "So, your choices: Run and fight, or save us both trouble and let me fuck you senseless now." He rumbles a hum at the end, like a purr and it vibrates from his chest to yours.

Your jaw tingles with nausea and nerves, but you force your voice steady. "I'm assuming you'll give me a head start?" Like option two is even an option. He might as well have not said it at all.

He laughs, properly humored. But he nods. "Have my word, doll." He inhales a deep breath, makes that strange hum again, says "You got 15 seconds." And completely vanishes into thin air leaving you reeling for a moment. But just for a moment.

You bolt, throwing yourself through darkness and fear to the exit like a prisoner set free. Everything's the same. Except for color. It's all been swapped for greys and blacks and dull blues, and shadows no longer exist. There's no sound apart from the echo your shoes make, loud and elongated like you're in an empty hallway.

When you push outside however is your biggest pause.

The sky. It's blood red. And fast. Clouds shoot across the sky as if you're trapped inside a time-lapse. Which reminds you: you don't have time to waste. You need to run. Find a weapon. But mostly you just need to run.

So you do. All the while wondering where you're running to, where you are, and what you have to find your way back to.

_"_ _Open your eyes."_

 

April 24th (just after Castiel's phone call)

Sam hangs up, drops his phone into his coat pocket, and stares into the deserted street of an old country road, wondering how to break the news to Dean. Wondering what Dean's response is going to be. First things first: they need to activate the wards that will hide them from you.

"Sam?"

His name is quietly whispered, afraid to break the silence.

He peeks over his shoulder at Emily. "What's up?" he asks, and turns his attention back to the road.

"Nothing." She walks over, eyeing his back, analyzing his behavior. Or lack thereof. "Woke up, saw one of the group was missing. Thought maybe something happened."

Something did happen. Not that he'd tell her. It's getting harder to not tell her though.

He forces a faint smile. "Nah. Just couldn't sleep." He lies, and she hums in understanding, following his action of staring into the approaching morning. Maybe another hour before the sun bursts on the horizon. "Head on back, get some more rest." He prompts, when she hesitates, he pushes his smile to something easier to believe.

He watches her go, quirks an eyebrow when she half-turns on her way to look back at him. She thinks something is amiss with Sam, and she's right. But he can't let her validate that theory. So, he needs to start drawing better cards.

When the door clicks shut, he sighs. It's a shame then that he isn't in the mood to play cards. Ironic.

He waits a few minutes, lolly-gagging without purpose. He hopes you aren't in any danger, he hopes you can fight the effects of the weakened seal, he hopes Castiel can find you, and he really hopes Jace and Emily never find out who he and his brother truly are.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you noticed the excruciating amount of sarcasm in the note up top...I've been watching a lot of House M.D. I think that's enough of an explanation, right? I might update again later today, don't know yet.


	5. Bad Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jace is fine following someone's lead, after so long being on his own, being his own backup, having no one to talk to....he's more than fine letting someone else take the reins. But...He can't help but feel that direction got left back in SC and now they're just wandering. He can't wander. He has to find you. Even if it means splitting up, even if he has to say goodbye to Sam and Dean. Nothing- nothing is more important than finding you. It's what kept him alive, it's why he's still here, it's why he can't close his eyes without going back there. He'll survive anything, so long as you're still out there.

April 26th

 

All things considered, it’s not awful.

They found a working car, one in alright condition with trust-worthy tires, the windows go down and up, the air conditioning sometimes kicks on…

But Jace can’t shake the feeling that something’s wrong. For the last couple of days Sam and Dean have been on edge, wound tight and stiff-shouldered like they expect something to jump at them from the shadows at any moment.

They haven’t talked much, only to prompt and encourage the way west. They seem as if they have a destination in mind, but they don’t give any reason for the emergency march toward the west coast. Emily’s pried about it, but they masterfully avoid her questions or deflect any inquiries with an amount of ease that has Jace squinting.

Lately it appears that everything is taboo with them. Jace is starting to realize how little he knows about Dean and Sam, how reluctant the two of them are to supply any kind of answers about anything. Everything is a secret with the Winchesters.

And Emily doesn’t mind. But of course she doesn’t; she’s trapped in the soulful depths of Sam’s mesmerizing hazel-hues.

Jace minds.

And that bothers him. He shouldn’t care. What does it matter that he doesn’t have a play-by-play of their first day of the apocalypse? Or that he doesn’t know whether they’ve lost people or been alone this whole time? Who cares that he knows literally nothing about them?

They risked their lives to spring him from that prison, they’ve watched out for Emily and himself, saved his life again when he was shot…

He feels ungrateful for wanting answers from them.

But there are question marks surrounding them. There always have been, and while Jace feels like he can trust them, he’s hesitant to simply because those question marks have multiplied, not dwindled over time.

Jace resituates, throwing a leg up on the seat, careful not to kick Emily by accident. She eyes his foot on the middle of the backseat but doesn’t say anything. It’s been quiet in the car for some time now, the only sound being the tires on the road, and the occasional one-two tap of the windshield wipers.

Jace hasn’t said anything. He knows that if he were to open his mouth all that would come out would be questions and inquiries dripping in suspicion. And he wouldn’t drop it like Emily did. He’d push and push and push until something broke. Which would be this little dynamic here.

He would like to say his reluctance is merely logic based: Emily and himself have hardly a chance of surviving on their own. She’s reliable and deadly, and he isn’t a push-over. But…in the apocalypse women and kids are the most sought-after thing. To try and best the horrors of the wasteland on their own is suicide.

See, that’s the logic that stands to reason.

But the biggest reason is simply because he’s come to like them. They fit in with Emily and himself, they fill in this spot that Jace didn’t know needed filling. They’ve started to feel like family.

But family are people you know. And he doesn’t know them, not really.

He’s on a merry-go-round with his process of reasoning: arriving back at every question mark, no closer to an answer as when he began.

“Next pair of scissors I find, I’m cutting your hair.” Emily says, eyeing Jace’s blond mane critically.

He rolls his eyes, turns his body into the corner of the door and the seat. “You’re just jealous because I have better hair than you.” He drops his eyelids, already done with the conversation.

She snorts at him, whacks his leg off the seat, ignores the scowl he shoots her, and talks to Sam. “You too. You look like you’re headed to a hippie convention.”

Dean laughs, nodding in agreement and slapping his hand lightly on the steering wheel. When Sam glares at him, he shrugs in the middle of his chuckling, “Seriously, you like Shaggy, dude.”

“Coming from the guy that still uses the term ‘dude’.” Sam shoots back, frowning about being ganged-up on.

“What? You still say dude.” Dean argues, pointing in accusation.

Jace rolls his eyes from the backseat, just in time for Dean to catch him in the rear-view. “What?” Dean pops at him, and when Jace raises his eyebrows innocently Dean narrows his eyes, “What, kid?”

Jace holds his hands up, palms out, appeasing even though he’s not the least bit intimidated. “Nothing…”

Dean nods, firm, mostly in his chin, and takes a second to look at everybody. Sam frowning a smile, Emily non-chalantly focused on passing scenery, and finally at Jace who’s resting his chin in his palm, elbow on the door panel.

It’s quiet. Not strained or tense but just quiet, uncharacteristically. Which is because Sam and Emily are waiting for Jace’s closing line of sass.

“Dude…”

Dean huffs, throws some fuel on the fire. “You’re a little shit.”

Jace laughs, shaking his head in disagreement. “Anyway,” he sits up, dragging his hair back through his fingers, catching dead strands which he lets loose out the window. “Where are we headed?”

“West.” Dean supplies, sling-shot quick and Jace puckers his expression in sarcastic thought.

“Yeah. But where? You know ‘west’ is kind of broad,” He gestures wide-spread hands and high eyebrows, amber eyes pinched in the corners. “What’s in the ball-park?”

Dean flicks his eyes up to meet Jace’s, giving away nothing and drags his focus back to the road. There’s hardly any danger to not watching the road anymore: there aren’t many cars out and about, and those that broke down are hunkered on the side, immobile and rusting.

After a few seconds of silence on Dean’s end, Jace presses on. “Do you have a state in mind? Or a time-zone you want to sample?” There’s the snark sneaking through.

Dean sighs, tight and irritated. “What I have in mind is putting South Carolina and all those crazies behind us.”

Oh, okay. Here we go, Jace thinks. “Great. South Carolina’s gone. Been gone for about a day…so where are we going, Dean?”

“What is this, Twenty Questions?” Dean huffs, fists tightening on the steering wheel. After a breath or two is when he responds. “Somewhere safe. Anywhere is safer than on the doorstep of that cult.”

Jace blinks. Slowly. Lets Dean’s words sink in. And then he glares. “You idiot.”

That captures Dean’s undivided attention. “Excuse me?” Dean says, snapping a venomous glare at Jace in the mirror.

“There is no such thing as ‘safe’. Ever.” Jace shakes his head. “You’re wasting our time trying to find somewhere ‘safe’. That’s something that doesn’t exist anymore.” He falls back into the seat, thunking his head on the head-rest. “So, find a destination. A real one.” He crosses his arms, stares up at the ceiling. “Otherwise, looking for Neverland is going to get us killed.”

Jace can feel Dean’s glare. It’s obvious he doesn’t like his leadership being called into question, either that or he just doesn’t like being doubted for anything. But, sometimes it’s necessary. Like now. Jace and Emily have placed their lives in the Winchesters hands, he wants to be sure it isn’t a mistake.

It’s one thing to survive, it’s another to follow.

“You figure out where we’re going yet?” Jace asks, perfectly intent on being a-

“Little shit.”

“You’re just jealous because I have better hair than you, Dean.”

The oldest Winchester snorts, but otherwise doesn’t respond. He’s too busy thinking. Thinking about how awful it will all be when they finally meet up. They are headed somewhere.

Headed to meet Cas. He’d been updating Sam on his location for the past couple of days, every five hours or so. The first ten or twelve were merely: In Kansas. Still haven’t found her. Border of Kansas. Nothing. Have a feeling she’s close. Still in Kansas.

Now they’re getting more specific. In Paola, starting to sense something. Belleville: Not here. Fort Scott…sensed something.

Today. Today was the break they’d been waiting for.

_“Cottonwood Falls. Found her. Put her to sleep. Keeping her safe. Seal is compromised. Dangerous for the two of you to get close.”_

But when has danger ever persuaded the Winchesters not to do something. If anything, it’s a challenge.

So, off they go to Cottonwood Falls. With no idea what to do with the people in the backseat of this car. Oops.

Dean figures they can slip out one of these nights that they stay in an abandoned building. Call first watch, wake up Sam, and disappear into the dark. Simple. Easy? No.

See, he may have gotten a little…attached these last few weeks. Dumb idea. And then Sam- Sam went and caught feelings for Emily. Great. Greeat! NOT great.

In all types of logic Dean doesn’t know why he’s on the fast-track to get to you. It’s a bad idea, what with the weakened seal and your grudge, and the fact that these people you care about are tied up with him. Correction: that _he’s_ tied up with these people you care about.

But there’s just this overwhelming urge to…find you. See you face-to-face. He doesn’t know why. In the beginning, he wanted to chase you down with gun in hand and pump you so full of lead you’d bleed bullets. You were a thing he needed to hunt.

And now…now you’re a person he needs to find. To…keep safe? To apologize to?

His fists tighten again, lips pursing. He flips his gaze over to Sam, thinking about a couple days ago. After Castiel’s call. Sam pulled him away from the group when he had a chance and told him. And all Dean felt was relief. He was relieved. And when Sam told him to use the ward Raziel gave to the both of them…he felt resignation.

Dean jumped through the hoops of being worried and horrified, and agreed with Sam about using them. He did. Only…

Dean wasn’t wearing his. It was never in his mind to use it. Maybe before. Before the church, if things went to shit he would’ve worn it. But, after…after what he did finally filtered through…he wasn’t going to protect himself from you.

He didn’t deserve that right.

It was like justice when Sam told him that it was necessary they wear them because you’d be after them if the seal weakened anymore.

He had felt like screaming “Hallelujah!”

“Are we there yet?”

Dean rolls his eyes at Jace’s shit-stirring. “Do you see a sign that says “Welcome to Kansas!”? No? Then we aren’t there.” Is his gruff reply.

Sam’s eyes about bug out of his head, as if saying _are you insane? You can’t tell them where we’re going!_

Dean gives his own facial response, _Oh well. Shit’s going to hit the fan, Sammy. Can’t pretend it won’t._

“Kansas?” Jace pipes up, and even Emily is curious, quiet as she is.

“What? You got a problem with Kansas?” Dean snips, quirking an eyebrow in challenge.

“N-no. Nope.” Jace responds, shrugging his shoulders.

“Good.” Dean grunts, letting his grip on the wheel loosen.

 

Later that night….

 

“Ok,” Dean murmurs, poking his head over the hood of some non-descript car, squinting in the dark at the obscure shape of a one-story house they plan on staying in for the night. Sam, Emily and Jace are crouched behind him, lined up along the body of the car.

“Sam,” Dean motions for his brother, but Jace grabs the bigger Winchester’s arm.

“I’m going with.” Jace declares quietly, locking eyes with Dean. He can feel the disagreement radiating off of him. “I’m not asking.” Jace cements his proclamation, drawing his pistol from his thigh holster after handing off the satchel that housed most of their miscellaneous materials.

All the adults share looks with each other asking, _are you going to stop him?_

Dean sighs, not as quiet as he should, making the level of his aggravation obvious. “Fine. You stay close, don’t take any risks-“

“Let’s go. I wanna sleep sometime this century.” Jace interrupts, shifting on his knee. Simple. Just casing a house out in the middle of nowhere.

Dean grunts, looks over Jace’s head at Sam and Emily. “Keep an eye out.” He tells them. Wordlessly, Emily lifts her rifle, night-vision scope mounted and assumes a position: rifle resting on the frame of back door, hidden in shadow of the car’s interior, crouched, still as death, and ‘keeps an eye out’.

Sam steals away a few yards to the left and uses another car as cover to keep watch, and safeguard Dean and Jace’s entry into the house.

There’s rain in the air, hanging on the breeze is the scent of water and earthly dampness, crickets chirp ceaselessly in excitement for the oncoming moisture. The moon glows with quiet beauty, turning clouds ashen grey, and the lack of humidity leaves them looking flat, almost like smears of grey paint on a black canvas.

Grass is high, flanking the sidewalk to the front porch in an impressive wall of swaying vegetation that persists all the way to the railing posts. The stairs are old and creaky, sun warped and beaten by the environment.

Dean goes first, his footsteps near silent: the stairs quietly protest under his weight, but the sounds of insects and rustling brush covers the squeak. Jace is right on his heel, matching him step for step with uncommon ease, and an air of familiarity. Like going through the motions of an everyday task.

On the night-vision scope, Emily squints. She can only see one figure of bright green, luminescent. Jace is following so close and expertly, he seems to have become a literal shadow of Dean. Once up on the porch though, that glowing shape splits off.

Jace heads to one end of the porch, his gait and footsteps light, lengthy. They both peer in the darkened windows, eyes narrowed to mere slits to pierce into the shadowy innards of the house. Moonlight spears into the house from other windows by mere slivers: between boards that have been nailed up. Or in splotches like a spilled beverage: through holes in blankets that cover the windows.

Nothing moves inside, as far as they can tell, so after a soft whistle from Dean, Jace slinks back to the front door, perfectly in time with Dean. There’s no waiting, or hesitation, or wondering about directive on Jace’s end. He instinctually appears to understand what to do, when to do it, and how fast, all without any prompting from Dean.

Dean thinks Jace would make a fantastic hunter. Once or twice the same thought has occurred to Sam.

A slight incline of the head toward the door is the only gesture Dean gives, and Jace reaches for the screen door, feels the catch of the wood, the slight resistance in the doorjamb and knows if he opens it slowly, it’ll scream to be heard for miles around.

A swift, hard yank and it opens smoothly. Dean glides in, Jace follows, pulling the door with him just as fast and quiet, and then they’re in the foyer of this tiny home. The air is stale, dry, and calm with abandon. It’s obvious that no one has been here in a while, that no one is here at all.

Still, Dean stands on ceremony: he waits in the foyer for a few seconds, adjusting his breathing to match the creaks and squeaks of the house. And Jace maps out pockets of silvery moonlight on the floor and walls, memorizes the way they shift and move, and where the sounds of the house sighing originates from.

And then as one unit, the two of them move forward, guns drawn but lowered, and they survey the rooms. One taking an initial sweep, and the other plunging ahead with more purpose. They swap jobs, combing the rooms in complete silence. It’s almost as if the two of them are not even in the house they are so quiet.

When they reach back and sweep the last room- a walk-in laundry/bathroom -they holster their pistols, and breath deep. Deeper than they have been.

“Hey,” Jace murmurs, snatching Dean’s attention: he was in the middle of wrestling his flashlight out of his jacket.

“Hm?” Dean wonders, flicking his light on. He keeps the beam low at first, looking for anything of use on the floor.

Wordlessly, Jace opens the cabinet under the sink for Dean to look into. “You have some sort of plan, right?” He says, digging his own flashlight out to help, and also to avoid the possibility of eye-contact, low as it is.

“What do you mean?” Dean stalls, waving his beam over and around bottles, glancing at labels with hardly any intent.

“Emily and I, we have people we want to find.” Jace reminds him, perusing over-head shelves of towels, sheets, and pillows above the washer and dryer. He takes the sheets and pillows, doesn’t mind the dust.

“I know.” Dean mutters. Boy, does he know.

“It’s just-“ Jace hesitates, piling and shifting the material in his arms as he tries to find the right way to word his thoughts. “It isn’t that we aren’t grateful, because we are. _I_ am.” Jace throws out there, watching the shape of Dean’s shoulders jump and rise and slide as he looks, and then stands.

“But you want to find your friends, and if interests vary among us we’ll be splitting up,” Dean interjects, tone even, knowing. But slightly incensed nonetheless at the prospect. See, he was all set and prepared to do the leaving. He wasn’t prepared to be left.

Common theme in his life, really.

“…yeah.” Jace sighs, following Dean into the hallway. “I was gone for three months, and they never stopped looking for me. Not a single day…Now they’re missing.”

Dean nods, the motion barely perceivable in the darkness. “I get it, Sherlock. From day one, I understood just how important you all are to each other. Emily made it pretty clear.”

Jace manages a smile. She doesn’t give up easy, and he’s glad about that. He owes her. A lot. Back when Quin first let him handle a fire-arm Emily taught him how to use it. She’s a sharp shot, and just as quick as she is accurate. In no time he became efficient with a pistol, and then the revolver. He had just started learning to shoot the rifle when he had been kidnapped. More than anything he wanted to carry a shotgun, but the recoil was too much for him back then.

He was too skinny, all skin and bones and no muscles. That’s changed though. He’d like to try the shotgun now. He thinks he can handle it.

“But right now, putting SC in the rear-view as far back as it can go is the main objective. Those cultists kidnapped you once as leverage; I wouldn’t put it past them to try and do so again.” Dean waves him on ahead, to the living room, talking as he goes. “Don’t get me wrong, I understand how you feel, but I just want to make sure we’re in the clear before we focus all of our attention on something else,” He stops in the foyer, hands on his hips, flashlight beam cutting a stripe across the faded carpet of the living room.

Jace nods, rolling his shoulders. “I hear you.” He dead-pans, annoyed with monologue/lecture. “Until our interests differ, my life and Emily’s are in your hands. But only until then.” He feels like Dean is handling him with kid gloves, and it irks him. He’s able to understand a lot more than Dean thinks he can.

Sure, he’s smart-mouthed and moody, but also level-headed and logically reasonable. Able to see the big picture but also to pull out the finite details of a mural.

Dean doesn’t say anything in response. What is there to say? So he just nods softly as if hearing the idle chatter of a conversation he isn’t invested in. Jace heads into the living room to set up the sheets and pillows, and Dean goes to the door.

He swings it open, whistles two quick notes, and waves Emily and Sam forward. Dean understands why Jace wanted to come with: to make his and Emily’s stance clear, to call into observation their specific goal. It was quiet, without the pressure of second-opinion, or sugar-coating in order not to offend. Between just himself and Jace there wasn’t a chance of anyone’s feelings getting hurt.

When Emily and Sam reach the door, Dean points them toward the living room to lay all their gear down. He half follows them, but continues on toward the kitchen, talking to his brother, “There’s a long dining table in here. Should flip it on its side, push it against the door,”

Sam’s already nodding, handing his duffel to Emily in order to get this done as quick as possible. In the end, they also shove an uncomfortable and obscenely heavy armchair right up to the door as well. With no back door to worry about, and all the windows covered, they settle into the living room.

Emily takes the couch, at the vehement insistence of all three boys and is out like a light within moments. Sam slumps into a recliner, making use of it: stretching his legs out, and pushing the restraints of the lazy-boy to the max.

Jace is still up, securing the blankets covering windows with the few thumb-tacks he found in a kitchen drawer. Dean is here and there around the house, inspecting the windows, pawing around in drawers, looking between mattresses, etc.

It’s finally begun to rain, and the house practically roars with the onslaught of big fat drops hitting the roof. Jace doesn’t know how Sam and Emily are sleeping it’s so loud. He’s used to cold silence, deafening silence that makes your ears rings if you don’t fall asleep fast enough. And the pitch dark. Which is half the reason he’s securing the blankets at the windows.

When Dean finishes his rounds, he finds Jace leaning against a bare wall facing the hallway, arms crossed, one ankle resting on the other, and chin straight. He’s awake. Despite the bed he made on the floor.

Two sheets folded long ways with a pillow at one end. It’s the shift bed. Comfortable enough to slip off to dreamland, but not comfortable enough to stay there.

Wordlessly, it’s conveyed across the room to Dean just by a simple tilt of the head from Jace: _I’ve got first watch._

Dean doesn’t have the energy, or the desire to argue. He’s ready for a little R&R, and he won’t try to be a golden hero and insist on sacrificing a few hours of sleep to appear like a selfless leader. If the kid wants to take first watch, let him.

Something seems to be nagging at the young Callahan, something the teenager wants to simmer on by himself. Which is fine for Dean. He’s not really in the sharing and caring kind of mood.

It’s a few seconds, the walk across the room, the removal of all his weapons, the ache in his body as he sinks to the floor, and then the wonderful sensation of nothing as he falls helplessly into sleep.

Jace watches and listens for a few minutes as everyone breathes peacefully, and stares out a hole in the blanket over the window. He can’t see much, mostly just moonlight glinting off of things. He closes his eyes and lets the sound of the rain cover his senses, lulling him into a sensation not unlike a rocking boat.

The first night in that prison was much like this.

 

_Right off the bat he knows he’s in deep shit. The walls of the prison are impeccable, smooth, un-scaleable. And guards are patrolling the open ground with rifles and shotguns in their arms, there are a line of Humvees on the other side of the yard, intimidating and monstrous with artillery rifles mounted on the roofs._

_Spotlights hang from the corners of fences on the guard towers and Jace’d bet anything they work. There aren’t other people in the yard either, everyone that’s out and around are members of the cult. Already he can draw the conclusion that the operators of this prison are adamant, have clearly worked towards the goal of keeping their prisoners in. They’ve taken measures to ensure no one gets out._

_This is the only time he’s going to see the outside of the prison: on this two-minute walk toward his soon-to-be cellblock._

_So, he memorizes everything he can, as fast as he can and blocks everything out._

_The jeering and yelling, the stares and scoffs, the primal anger. None of it reaches him. Not even the fear he feels underneath the desperate and compulsory action of filing everything away, memorizing and calculating and finding answers to questions and equations._

_He has to plan a way out of here. He has to come up with a way to survive._

_The inside is locked up just as tight, with guards at the end of every hallway, and every gate locked with only one key to spare: one guard holds the key for the hallway he’s in. And each guard is equipped an Ak of some sort and a baton. Walkie talkies are strapped to the shoulder of the bullet proof vests they’re wearing._

_Jace looks for markers of some sort, directions he can use in the chance that he escapes. But anything that gives away location has been removed: there are no plaques or nameplates for doors, exit signs have been taken down, and paint has been scraped away on the floors and walls, possibly at one time they were directions, or simple placeholders. You know, You Are Here!_

_But there’s nothing. Not even something small like a burnt out light. All the lights in every hallway are in working order, and there are only two, one at each end. Everything looks completely the same. So, all he has is the number of turns he’s taken: how many lefts and how many rights. And then he remembers it backwards, works it the way back._

_It’s loud outside, but in his mind it’s calm like untouched water, and just as clear with everything he’s memorized floating to the surface to swim for him. He’s blank, repeating and repeating and repeating everything he’s seen in his head, oblivious to the goings on around him._

_He’s uncuffed, shoved into a room, and closed in pitch blackness._

_It’s just another piece of information for him. He paces the room, measuring his steps from one end to the other, estimating the length of the walls. He feels the door, runs his fingers over the hinges hoping to feel rust, and when he doesn’t he skims his hands over every inch of wall he can._

_Jace finds an unsettling answer to a question._

_Is escape possible?_

_N/A._

_He finds another angle. The grate. He measures how big it is, feels the width of the bars, the grittiness of them and he has hope._

_They’re rusted. The entire grate is rusted._

_And for good reason. When Jace listens hard, he can hear water dripping, and can smell dampness, and if cold has a smell, he can smell it too._

_Is escape possible?_

_Maybe._

_He begins his first night in prison dedicating everything to memory. Until it’s all as familiar to him as his old address. The information he has is all at the surface and covers his emotions like a thick blanket, too heavy to lift._

_He doesn’t sit in the corner, he stands, leaning against the far wall directly across the from door. He stands all night, and listens to a storm in a way he never has before._

_He listens to the aftermath: waters gush down below and roar, and he wonders how much it rained, and if there was lightning? He wonders if the thunder was loud, because he didn’t hear any of it. All he knows is that it stormed, and it rained, and now that rain is in the underbelly of the prison, on its way out from some drain pipe._

_He stands all night and listens to a storm from grate in the middle of his cell, and he doesn’t move a muscle._

_Keys jingle, and rattle and screech in a lock’s chamber. Light floods the room, piercing every corner and cranny, but it falls first on Jace standing in the same spot he’s been all night. For a straight stretch of nine hours._

_When he opens his eyes, he doesn’t wince into the light or ease his way towards it. He stares boldly ahead, tired amber orbs steadfast and cold like ice has settled into honey. A figure steps into the light, his silhouette a sharp shape, the front of him cloaked in darkness and shadow._

_He doesn’t say anything and neither does Jace. Not for a whole minute._

_The figure moves. He claps his hands in front of him, and whatever he does next is not certain. It’s too dark to see properly, but Jace thinks the guy points at him. “I like this kid. He’s got a pair, and-“ he breaks off to laugh, and wave someone over, tries to at least but there’s not enough room in the doorway. He doesn’t seem to mind all that much._

_“Get a load of that look in his eyes.” The figure sighs, long and appreciative. “I wouldn’t expect anything other than the coldest of the cold to surround him though. Ahri’s got himself quite a group of protectors this time around.”_

_It doesn’t make any sense, none of what he’s saying means anything to Jace. He just seems to be rambling._

_“Alright. Let’s get him in the circle, see what he’s got.” The man orders lightly, his tone limp like a dead fish, as if he doesn’t care but it’s all part of protocol. He walks away so fast it’s almost as if he disappears into thin air._

_Someone else takes up the doorway while Jace blinks in wary fashion, and this person is brusque and abrasive. “You. Let’s go, get moving.”_


	6. Cold Conscience

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's a reason he's cold, there's a reason he finds peace in the dark, there's a reason that killing is like breathing for him. It's easy, but it isn't simple. He's fully aware that he isn't the same person you became best friends with and there's a part of him that's glad. Because that part of him is going to lead him to you, it's going to keep him alive, and God help whoever gets in the way.

_Jace does what he’s told, his self-preservation instincts present, but not screaming, just quietly whispering to him. They don’t go the way he came in, instead, they go in the opposite direction and Jace begins making room in his head for more information. More things to memorize, just in case an opportunity presents itself._

_Up a flight of stairs in a narrow case, around a corner, down through a wide hallway, through a pair of heavy double doors and then another hallway. Until he emerges into a cellblock, an honest to goodness cellblock with levels and staircases and guard booths, and ominous stains on the concrete from prison fights back in the day._

_Only, some of it isn’t old._

_As Jace walks, he looks at the floor and the rust-brown trails of blood from not long ago. And he sees spots here and there where blood has pooled in small amounts and soaked into the grout of the floor, drops dit-dot, spatter streaks, and large amounts smear. And not all of it is dry._

_The blood trails lead down a walkway flanked on both sides by chain-link fence that are secured to poles drilled to the ground and fastened with hinges. In the middle of the floor is a ring of sorts, it’s jaggedly round and made by more chain-link fence over six feet tall. Metal sheets cover the first three and a half feet of fence and sandbags rest in places around the circle._

_Benches from outside have been brought in and surround the cage, rows of bleachers take up room on the first floor. In the guard booths are boxes of canned goods and packaged snacks, and crates of alcohol. The door to the booth is shut, but the window has been busted out._

_Canned goods and alcohol go out, and ammunition goes in. The latter being the required currency to get the former._

_All these things drop into his mind with the speed of a falling rock from a twenty-story building._

_And all at once, the terror that he’s been holding back rears its ugly as he’s shoved into this new cage, the realization hitting him when the gate clangs closed._

_He’s in a cage. To fight. Most likely for his life. And people are filing in now, and they’re staring at him like he’s something and not someone. And other people are buying drinks and snacks, and talking to one another with loud voices and laughing, as if he isn’t even in the room, as if the cage- the shoddy arena -isn’t there._

_Jace drops his gaze to the floor, at all the old stains, all the blood that’s been spilt, the blood that spatters the metal sheets, and clings to the links in sticky layers. He looks down at his boots, and blanches. He’s standing in a puddle of blood, still very wet and very red._

_People on the upper levels stare down at him, with expressions that claim they know something he doesn’t. As if being a few feet higher has granted them superiority and divine knowledge. He looks away from them, and stares ahead at the other side of the cage, at the other gate, and its dark entrance._

_He wonders who’s going to come down that aisle. He dually hopes it’s someone small, and someone big. He hopes it’s someone he can kill. And he also hopes it’s someone he can’t._

_“Alright, alright,” Someone says over the clamor and noise, and Jace follows the voice to a tall man standing on the highest level of a bleacher. “You know what night it is, and you know the run-down. But for those of you new to the compound, let me tell you how the night’s going to go.” The man turns, and points right at Jace, hard brown eyes slicing through the distance and the fence to cut down Jace’s bravado. “We have two contestants for each round, and five rounds in total. The first round is fresh blood only: new ‘citizens’,”_

_The man, who has a very pointy nose, Jace notices, is very familiar with his words, they roll off his tongue like compulsion. “Each round after features survivors from previous nights. If you wish to bet on a contestant we have a list pinned to the far left wall, and Steely-“ He pauses to point at a corner, two barrels hold up an old door that’s being used as a table. At this table is another man, older with flecks of gray in his hair; he waves at the crowd from his seat behind the barrels._

_“Steely will take your bets, and cash you out at the end of the night depending on your winnings. We negotiate on no terms. If your contestant loses, tough shit, you aren’t getting your money back.” Some grumbling follows this statement but he’s unaffected. He takes a long drink from a bottle of beer that’s been dangling from his hand this whole time._

_Jace is shell-shocked. Suddenly all that information he memorized seems useless. Those self-preservation instincts are roaring at him now, no longer quiet whispers._

_He feels the hair on the back of his neck raise, and a shiver rack his spine and he knows someone is staring at him. And he feels where it’s coming from._

_He looks up at the second level, crowded with people except for one end, the far end that’s shorter and doesn’t house a staircase. A man stands by his lonesome, arms spread with his hands braced on a railing. Jace meets his piercing, deep blue eyes, half-lidded but no less weakened in intensity._

_Jace wavers in his ability to hold the man’s gaze, but he does, and he feels…terrified, but awed at the same time. Those eyes feel as if they can spear through metal itself, so it’s no trouble for them to tear through Jace like a bullet through paper._

_Subconsciously, Jace lays a hand just under his chest, where the ribcage curves and gives way to the stomach, and he curls his fingers into his t-shirt._

_A man breaks through the crowd, sliding between bodies like water, and he reaches the one on the bleachers. Murmurs something to him that makes the orator raise an eyebrow and look at Jace- Jace who is too busy having a soul rendering staring contest with the man on the upper level to notice -but he nods all the same with a shrug that says ‘As you wish’._

_“Listen up, gutter trash, we got a change in plan for tonight,” He yells, effectively capturing attention by the third syllable. “New blood will advance through the ranks tonight. Whoever wins first round will then face the victors of the following rounds.” The crowd murmurs, a wire of excitement in the air._

_“First match starts….” He looks down at an imaginary watch on his wrist, “Now. It starts now, so place your bets, buy your booze and sit your asses down.” He grins, revealing an almost perfect mouth: he has a silver tooth and a chipped canine._

_A cheer goes up, but Jace barely hears it._

_He just manages to tear his eyes away as the gate is opened and a person is flung into the ring. But he can feel those eyes on him._

_The person across from him is frantic, and afraid and shaking so bad that when they lean back into the gate the links rattle. Their eyes dart from one face to the next, terrified witless, and Jace feels bad. Because he’s found his composure, and now he’s put on his jacket of cold logic and realistic knowledge._

_Only one person is leaving this cage alive._

_The crowd is quiet. Eerily so._

_There’s loop that’s happening._

_The quieter it gets, the more scared this new person becomes, the louder their breathing, the wider their eyes, and the greater their fear. And the more scared they get, the calmer Jace becomes. ON the surface. Inside, their fear pisses him off._

_The crowd is waiting for someone to move._

_So, he moves._

_And that person jerks back into the fence, doesn’t waste a second and starts begging, despite the fact that they have three inches and probably thirty pounds on Jace._

_But some people just weren’t born fighters._

_And it’s clear this person hasn’t fought any battles, because their only response when Jace gets close is to slap at him, and try to push him away. But Jace has had to fight to survive, and this is no different._

_A punch to the stomach and they drop to their knees, gasping for breath, staring at Jace’s boots from their peripherals all of two seconds before the Callahan’s hands find their jaw and the back of their head and everything goes dark for them forever._

_It’s still quiet, for an entire minute nothing breaks the silence. And Jace isn’t one hundred percent sure that he’s hearing because everything is so calm. Until someone starts clapping, slow but not sarcastic._

_Jace looks up and turns his head and isn’t surprised to find that man with the lulling eyes is the one clapping._

_Others copy him, and some cheer, properly surprised but happy that they bet on the right contestant. And all Jace thinks is that this was a fluke, that the next fight won’t be so easy. But he’s wrong._

_The victor of the second round knows enough to move around the cage and to guard their middle, but they don’t know much foot-work, and it’s easy to box them in._

_The third fight takes a little longer, this person knows a thing or two, how to throw a proper punch, get a strong stance and never leave your chest open. But they don’t know how vulnerable the sides are. They learn._

_The fourth…the fourth gives him pause because it’s a woman. And she takes advantage of his indecision. She lands a punch to his jaw and it’s all he needs to ground himself. She’s fast, and agile, and dodges his attacks well, stays out of his reach. So he coaxes her into his. Leaves himself ‘open’, and she swoops right in to exploit his mistake. But she ends up on her back, pinned with Jace’s boot on one wrist and both of his hands around her neck._

_There’s a break between the fourth and fifth round, and Jace sits near his gate as they open the other side and drag her body out. He closes his eyes. He noticed a difference in the third and fourth contestant. In the third there was hesitation, a desire to hold back. In the fourth it was nearly none existent. She came at him ready to kill._

_He dreads the fifth._

_“Hey, Killer. Hey.”_

_Jace opens his eyes, someone is near the gate, an arm stretched up to curl their fingers in the fence. They sound male, so Jace just assumes it’s a man._

_“What?” he asks, and the man smiles a flash of white inside the darkness of his hood that covers his entire face._

_“I’m the mediator for the crowd and the contestants. Someone in the crowd has a request: Kill the fifth victor, but spill his blood,”_

_Jace blinks and looks around the crowd, as if he can identify the requester._

_“Why?”_

_The Mediator shrugs, “Look, you fulfill the request, you get rewarded. This spectator wants to see some blood fly, and if you meet the request he’s prepared to give you a jacket.”_

_“A jacket?” Jace scoffs, and hears footsteps behind him: a guard arriving with another contestant. “Big fucking deal.” The gate swings open and Jace steps back, The Mediator following him on the other side of the fence._

_“Well, if you turn that down he’s prepared to offer up a can of soda.”_

_Jace watches the other gate open, feigning more interest in the match than the deal going on. “How much blood does he want to see?”_

_The Mediator grins wolfishly, light glinting off his teeth, and he chuckles darkly. “You better walk away with it under your fingernails.” He taps the fence, rings on his fingers smacking the metal and he drifts into the crowd, the coat he’s wearing long enough to kiss the backs of his heels._

_Jace watches him get swallowed up by the sea of people, and he has no idea he talked less than a foot away with a demon. NO idea. All he knows is that he’s winning the next fight and he’s getting a soda for it._

_He glances into the ring, half-hearted, and can’t make much out from the blur of movement. The gate is pretty closed up, reinforced with metal sheets and bars and it’s difficult to see in from this angle. But the spectators are boisterous and excited, they’re yelling and roaring like this a football game and they’re rooting for their team that’s losing by a touchdown._

_Couldn’t be farther from the truth._

_He rubs at his jaw, the ache from that punch the woman landed on him is deep in his skin, and Jace knows that’s it’s bruising, probably swelling._

_That’s going to be something the other contestant sees and goes for, a small weakness. He might have to use that to his advantage._

_Jace lifts his eyes, meeting that other man’s eyes so easily it’s like they both planned it. He was watching the fight, but he always come back to look at the kid, curious. He was the one that ordered the change in routine for the night._

_He’s glad he did. Seeing the teenager in action is like watching a masterpiece happen. Watching Leonardo paint the Mona Lisa couldn’t compare to witnessing the tact and precision, the grace with which the young Callahan kills._

_He might have to make a point in coming back every now and again, but tomorrow he leaves to return to the warehouse in Oregon. So, he had to see the kid tonight. He had to._

_The orator announces the winner of the fifth round, and there’s a pause where the body is dragged out. It was the contestant from Jace’s side. And the person he now has to fight doesn’t have a problem drawing blood._

_He steps in, tracking bloody footprints and sizes up his opponent. Once again, they’re taller, and bigger, and blood thirstier. And this guy looks ready to kill, no hesitation whatsoever. He has blood dripping from his knuckles, and drops run down his face, not his own._

_Jace takes a couple steps forward, giving himself somewhere to go, and this guy doesn’t move as he heaves breaths into his massive chest. They stare at one another for a while, coming up with a plan of attack, prepping themselves._

_The beast of a guy moves first, and it begins. A stiff dance of cautious jabs and last-minute retreats and almost mistakes. It’s a tedious five minutes before someone lands a punch, and it’s the other guy. He cracks a cinderblock fist into Jace’s jaw and the teenager sees stars and planets for a solid two seconds and his burly opponent moves in._

_He believes Jace is dazed enough to warrant his own victory. But he doesn’t know his opponent as well as Jace knows him. The whole time they were dancing around one another Jace wasn’t coming up with a plan per se, but merely working out the man’s character, how apt he is to take a risk, if he was more familiar with his fists or his feet, how fast his reflexes are, if he can keep a cool head, etc._

_The man is arrogant, overconfident. And he proves Jace right when he rushes the teenager still recovering under the well-played ruse of discombobulation, his eyes closed._

_But Jace dodges at the last minute, a spin on his heel and he’s out of the way, the other man ramming into the fence with enough force to rattle half the cage._

_Jace kicks a foot out, his boot cracking into the side of the man’s knee, effectively snapping his leg. He growls in pain and snaps his head to glare at Jace, only to look at the tread of Jace’s boot and then taste blood a second later._

_He falls sideways to the floor, hands scrabbling, fingers skimming limply on the fence not able to find purchase. And Jace slams his boot into his face again for good measure, surely knocking the man’s teeth loose._

_This time he doesn’t make an attempt to get up, and Jace doesn’t give him the option of considering it. He straddles the man’s chest, ignores the blood soaking the man’s collar and gushing from his nose and he grabs the man’s head, palms over his ears._

_Jace lifts his head, slams it into the concrete. Once, twice, skull cracking on the ground. It sounds like a ruler slapped on a desk._

_Dark red spreads from under the man’s head, a small pool._

_Jace pauses._

_The man’s closed eyelids flicker-_

_Jace slams his head down again. Again, and again, and again until there’s so much blood that Jace has to grab the man’s hair to keep his hold. The blood has spread, it leaks out from under the fence, it soaks into the man’s shirt, flows underneath his limp arms on the floor to soak into Jace’s knees under his armpits._

_Jace bashes his head until he completely loses his grip and his hands wind up in the sticky red fluid, very warm, and almost black._

_He stands, breathing heavily, and grasps the fence for stability, the blood on his hands making his grip slippery. It’s quiet. Dead quiet. And Jace looks nowhere but everywhere all at once, meeting blank faces and open mouths. And he’s quiet. Dead quiet._

_The orator announces Jace as the winner in a slow, disbelieving tone, heavy on shock and drunk on awe. He says the night is over, and to see Steely for your cash._

_The other gate opens and two guards file in, sparing Jace a wary look. One of them points a baton at him and orders him to step away from the corpse._

_He does, but only after his gate is opened. He slips through before it’s even opened all the way and doesn’t watch them take that body down the corridor. He does watch his boots and the red prints they leave behind._

_Jace leans on the fence, blocking everything out like the steadily rising chatter and the occasional shatter of beer bottles. He keeps an eye out for The Mediator, but doesn’t see him anywhere, and the man doesn’t approach him._

_Time passes, but how much, he isn’t sure. People glance at him, a glint in their eyes, or they raise whatever container their alcoholic beverage is in as a salute to him. He pretends not to see any of it. He spends a long time standing stone still with his back against a metal pole and his arms limp at his sides, blood dripping from the tips of his fingers to hit the floor in splats that he can’t hear over the bedlam of the cellblock and the bodies in it._

_“Quite the show, Goldie Locks.” Comes a very familiar voice, it sounds like how rose water tastes and floats to Jace with all the grace of a Luna Moth._

_Jace turns his head, and finds those calculating blue eyes on him, pinning him like an insect to a board. “It wasn’t a show.”_

_The blue-eyed man frowns a frown that’s not at all sad, it’s limply thoughtful. “Not for you I suppose.” He takes a few steps towards Jace, nothing intimidating in his movements or in his voice, his face is passive._

_He snatches up one of Jace’s blood-stained hands. “But, then…why fulfill that request?”_

_Jace’s blood goes cold, and he lets slip just how loose his bearings have really been all night. “What?”_

_The man smiles knowingly, softly, in a kind appreciative way. “I’m not judging. In fact, I’m impressed.” He uses his other hand to pat the top of Jace’s._

_Jace yanks his hand free, his lips flat. “Who are you?” He hedges around the man, puts him between the gate and himself and takes a few cautionary steps back._

_The man smiles, like he’s been waiting all night for this question. “I’m Lucifer. You may have heard of me once or twice in passing.”_

_Jace scoffs, the absurdity of the statement overshadowing the former fear he had of this enigma. He shakes his head and takes a few more steps back, “I don’t believe in the devil.”_

_He smiles wider, those heavy-lidded eyes seeming to glow with an ancient kind of glee. “You should,” He says and dips his head._

_Jace turns, headed for that hallway, headed back the way he came. Away from the make-shift arena and the crazy man standing in one of the waiting stretches. He stops in his tracks and turns when the man says something else._

_“I believe in you.” He chucks something at Jace, and the teenager snatches it out of mid-air, a blur of red and shiny metal._

_It’s cold and cylindrical. When he looks down after sparing the man a wary gaze, he sees what it is. A can of soda. A can of Coca-Cola. His favorite kind of soda._

_He looks up. And the man is gone, leaving in his wake a chill that creeps into Jace’s bones with all the subtlety of a jagged knife. His hands shake for a reason unknown, but it doesn’t stop him from pulling the tab on his Coke and taking a greedy gulp._

_There’s a guard waiting at the top of the stairs, but he doesn’t say anything or urge Jace to hurry back to his cell. He just stands as Jace drinks his reward, and looks forward to drinking too._

_When he drains the can dry, he drops it to the floor, and looks up half expecting ‘Lucifer’ to be looking down on him from the second level. But he isn’t there. Jace moves before his eyes do, and soon his neck hurts from the strain of keeping the second level in his sights and he’s forced to stare ahead._

_Ahead into the darkened stairwell with a flickering light and claustrophobia inducing walls, and the noise dies behind him abruptly and consistently._

_It isn’t until they reach his cell, when he’s standing outside his door while the guard unlocks it that Jace remembers the last words that guy said, the last bits of conversation between them._

**_“I don’t believe in the devil.”_ **

**_“You should. I believe in you.”_ **

_Before he’s shoved in darkness Jace glances down at his hands and the blood covering them. The request, the man, the soda, the words._

_It seems Lu’s faith was rewarded. He believed in Jace to kill that man and take the extra mile._

_And he did._

_Jace isn’t shoved into his cell. He walks in, willingly, with unblinking eyes._

Jace cracks his eyes open, one centimeter at a time and checks that everything is still the same. The same people are asleep, in the same places, breathing the same kind of way, and he’s still the same. He glances down at his hands in the near pitch black.

They feel wet, and warm and sticky. He rubs his hands on his thighs, but it does nothing. The rain has died down, quieted to slow drops between large spaces of silence, and Jace leaves the living room, a hand on his thigh holster to stop it from making noise as he walks.

Ever the light sleeper and on edge, Dean peels his eyes open just as Jace steals around the corner and disappears down the hallway. Dean blinks sleepily into the dark at the two lumpy shapes of Emily and Sam, and then looks towards the window to make sure he really saw what he saw.

He did. Jace isn’t there against the wall. Cursing softly, Dean pushes himself out his comfy chair and yawns a silent sound as he follows in Jace’s footsteps only half as graceful through the grog of sleep. He peeks into every room as he passes, his eyes adjusting to the levels of darkness within the house.

Eventually he arrives at the laundry room, and finds Jace on the other side of the dryer, on the floor with his knees nearly to his chest and his arms making a bridge over them that he rests his forehead on.

He wishes he could say he was clueless. But Dean was quite familiar with the look of someone guilty, and trodden by it. The only thing he didn’t know, was what Jace felt guilty about. What was eating him up inside.

“I’m fine, Dean. Really. I just need a moment.”

Dean looks over his shoulder, considers that comfortable recliner and almost goes back to it. Almost. “People who are fine typically don’t ‘need a moment’…” He squats, and listens for Jace’s sass, waits for it. But it doesn’t come.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Dean asks, his hands dangling between his legs, forearms on his thighs.

“No. Not at all.” Jace shoots back and lifts his head, takes his flashlight and shines the beam right into Dean’s face. “I want-“

He stops mid-sentence, and Dean zeroes in the on the reason why. Wood creaks, scrapes loudly from one of the bedrooms and a soft thump follows. Jace and Dean share a hard look, and he turns the flashlight off.

Dean motions for Jace to wait, a gesture the young teenager barely sees in the dark, and a gesture he isn’t keen to listen to. But Dean steals away on silent feet and slips into the shadows of the hallway, and Jace gives the older man a five second head start before he follows.

It’s quiet in the house, which Jace finds odd considering the intruders. He passes an empty bedroom, and ducks in, waiting. He hears the floor creak somewhere, and then he hears Sam call out Dean’s name, most likely in warning because a crash follows the yell as well as a clatter and a grunt.

Jace peeks out into the hallway, the long expanse of wall and floor that leads straight to the door and the living room, and he sees a shape on the hardwood. He hears Emily grunt, flesh thud on flesh, and then he hears a gun cock.

It goes quiet again, and Jace creeps toward the window as words are spoken in the living room in a quiet manner. He doesn’t stay to listen, he clambers over the sill, vaults to the ground outside and draws his knife from his left boot and his gun from the holster on his right thigh.

He sticks to the side of the house, and watches the thick grass and weeds sway, he watches for a break in their back and forth rocking, and takes careful steps avoiding patches that would make noise. He pokes his head around the corner, eyeing the porch, and then crouches to scope the area, the driveway across the street, the few cars a ways down.

He waits, waits until noise from inside spurs him on. There’s yelling and scuffling, and Jace can only imagine that Dean has woken up from his forced siesta.

Jace slinks up the porch, bypassing the steps by pulling himself over the railing. He’s low, and the crouching steps he takes are making his thighs ache but they’re keeping him quiet so he endures until he reaches the window on the right side of the porch. One of the windows to the living room, he sits under it and listens.

Listens to Dean threaten whoever’s in there to no avail, because this voice, this other voice laughs and walks away. Walks toward the window and Jace wonders if this guy knows he’s there on the other side of this blanket over the gaping hole. But he stops short, for a reason Jace can’t decipher, not initially.

But after a second, he hears Emily gasp a breath and then hurry to take it back. And that other voice fills the space afterwards. “I know there’s a kid with you. We saw him with you. He’s not in the house, so where is he?”

Jace’s grip on his knife and gun tighten.

“For your sake, you’d better hope he’s long gone.” Dean grits out, in pain from some wound Jace can’t see.

That man does something, and it causes Emily to grunt, and either Dean or Sam to try something because there’s a little more scuffling. And then she full-on whimpers a moment later, and Jace is done waiting.

He stands, swipes his knife and jumps through the giant tear in the blanket, his arm already in a downward arc. He catches the man in the shoulder mid-turn and he cries out. Jace jams his gun into the man’s side and pulls the trigger twice.

He lets Emily go, and Jace wants to take the time to ask her if she’s okay but he doesn’t. Instead, he aims his gun at one of the men and shoots, sidelining the possibility of a negotiation for Sam’s life. Dean is on board, and throws his head back, knocking his skull into the nose of the man restraining him.

Jace lets Sam go to the aid of Dean, and offers Emily a hand. “You okay?” He asks her, his tone ice-water cold, and she just nods.

Wordlessly, Jace marches over to the guy that was restraining Sam and puts three more bullets in his chest.

“Wait, wait!” the last one says, on the verge of being stabbed and Jace freezes. He knows that voice.

Dean shakes his head, a blade held to the man’s throat. “Sorry, not in an accommodating mood.” His hand tightens, blood beads on the man’s neck-

“Dean, stop.” Jace says, his eyes locked on the ambusher’s face. He doesn’t wait for Dean to ask why, “I know him. He was at the prison…he’s the orator.”

Dean blinks, at his knife, the man’s face and then over his shoulder at Jace. “The orator? What the Hell does that mean?”

Jace approaches slowly, his gun and knife in a limp grip, and he talks to Dean, but he looks at the orator. “If anyone’s gonna kill him, it’s going to be me.” Jace breaks his gaze to stare at Dean who debates…

“Alright. I don’t know what the Hell’s going on, but okay.” He takes the knife away from the orator’s throat, and steps back.

“I never did learn your name, in all the time that I was there…” Jace muses, and watches the man swallow, the whites of his eyes easy to see in the dark because they’re so wide.

“It’s Henry.”

“Henry? Really?” Jace says, and holsters his pistol much to everyone’s unease. Except for him. He’s calm. “Okay, Henry…” He slides his knife into his boot, and smiles. “Run.”

Henry stares down at him, his heart hammering, and his mouth open. “What?”

Jace smiles wider, and tilts his head in the direction of the hallway. “Run.” He repeats, his voice sharp but soft and Henry gulps.

And then he bolts with clumsy steps and loud breathes and his hands slap at anything that can give him a launching point. Henry spills into a bedroom so fast he trips over the corner of a mattress and falls flat on his face.

Jace calls after him, mockingly. “Run, Henry! Run!” But he hasn’t moved from the living room.

Henry groans and crawls towards the open window, looking over his shoulder with frantic eyes. He scrambles through and slams into the ground on shaky knees. Throwing his head back and forth, he takes off for the street, makes it to the porch and trips over something.

Hissing, he kicks his legs tangled in a large wad of blanket and crawls backwards until he reaches the sidewalk. Henry stumbles to his feet and hobbles out into the middle of the street, he turns to look at the house, waits for something to happen. Waits to see someone leave and come after him, but nothing moves.

And he heaves a huge sigh. He turns, and freezes like a spike of ice. Jace stands not more than twenty feet away, casting a long shadow in the moonlight that touches the boots of Henry. Henry gapes and looks over his shoulder at the house.

“T-that’s not. There’s no way-“

“Henry, Henry, Henry.” Jace tsks. “I thought I told you to run?” He takes a few steps towards the man in question and Henry’s knees go weak.

“Look-“ He begins, and flinches when Jace holds a hand up, silencing him.

“Henry…Do you want to know how I’m going to kill you?” Jace asks, no hesitation or remorse, just a friendly chatting nature about his voice. Henry splutters as his mind jumps through three months’ worth of blood and carnage wrought from the kid in front of him and he wheezes a breath.

“Or would you rather it be a surprise?”

Henry tries another angle as Jace nears. “I betted on you. Every time.”

Jace laughs less than five feet away, the sound harsh. “Too bad it isn’t helping your odds right now.” He kicks Henry’s kneecap, reveling in the snap and the following cry pregnant with pain. Henry goes down on his back, groaning and looks up at Jace with fearful eyes, the boy’s shadow falling over him.

He knows how he’s going to die. He’s seen this before.

Dean, Sam and Emily watch from the broken window as Jace breaks the man’s leg, kicks him twice in the face, and then kneels over Henry’s chest. Emily’s stomach sinks when she sees Jace grab Henry’s head and slam the back of it into the asphalt. The crack of it reaches her ears dully and she only watches it happen twice before she turns away from the window.

Sam watches with a furrow in his brow, and Dean watches stoically. He watches when he knows the man is dead, and he continues to watch when Sam steps away. He watches when Jace finally stops, and then he watches Jace walk all the way back to the porch.

When he stands on the other side of the sill, he meets Dean’s eyes. And they have an unspoken conversation.

_This is what I didn’t want to talk about._

_This is exactly what you need to talk about._

_It won’t change anything._

_Except that keeping it inside you is killing you._ Dean offers Jace a hand over the wood frame, his hand out in the cool wind of the night.

Jace looks down at Dean’s hand and then up at his face. He blinks, and takes Dean’s hand.

Dean doesn’t say anything about the blood, just hauls Jace inside.

Sam and Emily are dragging one of the dead bodies down the hall, and Dean nudges Jace for help with the one he stabbed.

Jace shakes his head. “He isn’t dead yet. We should question him while he’s still breathing.”

Dean shoots a hard look at Jace that lingers. “You left him alive on purpose.”

Jace nods, and picks up a chair that’s been knocked over by the ambush party. He sets it on its feet and softly exhales. “I left him alive on purpose.” He agrees, his tone firm, and says, “I’m going to search the house for duct tape.” And leaves Dean alone in the living room with the man bleeding to death on the floor.

Dean shakes his head slowly, and runs his hands up and down his face. Dean is perpetually blind-sided by Jace, by the kid’s ruthlessness and then by his carefree attitude. One second the kid is light-hearted and cracking jokes, the next he’s a million miles away in Neverland with a haunting look in his eye.

Dean glances out at the street, at the shape of body with an almost missing head and rubs a hand over his mouth. And then he grabs the man under the armpits and drags him into that chair.

Jace appears in the doorway, with a roll of duct tape in hand and he pulls a long strip of it free. “The head space I’m in right now…” He walks over, and wraps the man’s chest in silver tape, around and around, “I can get answers out of him before he bleeds to death.” Around and around the tape goes, scratching and skritching and creaking and Dean watches with his hands in his pockets, his jaw firmly set and his eyes hard.

He watches Jace duct tape the man’s arms to the chair, and then his legs, and then Jace cocks an arm back, fist clenched and swings it back-hand into his face. The man jerks awake with a pained gargle, and is immediately sawing breath.

Jace taps the man on the cheek a couple times, and waits until his bleary eyes really see him to say, “Welcome back. I’ve got some questions I want you to answer.”

Dean stays, stays for entire stint, stoic and unmoved by the man’s pain as Jace systematically cuts off his fingers, one by one, slowly. He observes the calculated calm that Jace employs. He’d paused a couple times, only to wait for the man to stop screaming, to start in again, slower than before.

The guy loses 6 fingers before he gives up something. And then Jace asks him another question and the process starts all over. He doesn’t have any fingers left, and Jace regards the man thoughtfully, his arms folded and the bloody tip of the knife tapping against his chin.

And then quick as a whip he has the man under the jaw, holding him still and he puts the flat of the knife against the man’s cheekbone. The tip just barely touching his lower eyelid’s lashes. “Full disclosure, or I take your eye out. I feel like I don’t need to tell you how slowly I’m capable of doing it. Your ten fingers should have told you that.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll tell you.” The man says, his voice muffled from the grip Jace has on his jaw.

“Please do.” Jace replies, and retreats. He walks.

“It’s in Oregon. That’s where all the orders come from, it’s how we operate.” He gasps, sweat rolling down in his face in rivers.

“Where in Oregon?” Jace asks, closing his eyes, feeling tiredness seep into the cracks and corners of his body.

“Northern Oregon. It’s a warehouse in the forest. Big. Our leader is always there, hardly ever leaves.”

“Who is he?” Jace runs a finger over the dripping blade, glances at the man from his peripherals, makes the mistake of looking over at Dean. Dean’s not looking at the guy, hasn’t one time since Jace started interrogating him, he’s only watched Jace, watched his face, and listened to his voice.

“No one really knows. He’s reclusive, and never given his name, but he’s resourceful and cunning and persuasive.” He’s heaving for air, trying to stay conscious.

“Your cult is after me. What else are they after?” Jace murmurs, behind the man’s back now where he stops.

“A girl. We’re supposed to keep tabs on a girl travelling with a man in a trench coat. We aren’t supposed to hurt her.”

Dean’s eyes widen a fraction, but he covers his surprise before Jace can notice.

Jace narrows his eyes at the information. He can think of only one person. “And where is she now?” he hisses, boring holes into the man’s head with his eyes.

“We don’t know. She just dropped off the map a few days ago. Disappeared into thin air.” He breathlessly says, blinking sweat out of his eyes.

“Who else is after her?”

The man shakes his head, his eyes closed so as not to look at his stumps for hands. “Everyone.”

Jace forgets to breathe for a second, but just for a second. He looks down at the knife in his hand. “Thank you for your cooperation.” He says, and grabs a handful of the man’s hair to yank his head back. The blade slips along his throat and blood sprays like a sprinkler spits water, the man jerking in his chair in desperation as his life seeps from him in spurts he can see.

Jace sighs, opens his mouth but no words come. Are there words after what he had just done? He decides there aren’t and he shuffles down the hall, his eyes sliding closed. He’s tired.

He sinks down to sit on the floor, his back against the wall and he tips his head. He wipes his hands on his thighs, the stickiness uncomfortable. His hands stain his jeans.

_“I don’t believe in the devil.”_

_“You should,”_

He wipes his hands vigorously on his pants, his jacket, the floor…

_“I believe in you.”_

But it does nothing.

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aopqq205sgY>

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So there you have it. Jace was forced to kill other survivors of the apocalypse in order to ensure his own survival, and he met the Devil. Crazy day. Make note that this flashback only shows his first day in the prison. He was there for three months in total. I'll most likely revisit his time there, just a few little nightmares and what have you.


	7. Sammy Hagar'd Be Proud

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's taken more time than he's thought it would, but there's just something about stealing from someone you hate that's so...fulfilling. And, he does like the car. Shame about what happens to it, and the girl. Probably should've just left her. Oh well. And he was so close, too, on the doorstep practically. Wonder how he's gonna get out of this one?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I live. But just barely. I had to update because it's been forever on this fic and I don't want it to gather dust. I've got a lot of things in the workshop. A lot. I'm aware of this, believe me. Anywho, Rowan. A new female character, and those angels we met all the way back when. Yay.

April 29th

 

He’s made good time, and not for lack of traffic, but simply because he’s _forced_ driving to be easier than it is. A little finagling here and the car runs without gas, a tiny push there and the Impala suddenly has four-wheel drive. And a lot pushing for the broken-down cars and rubble in his way and he hasn’t had to stop at all, the speedometer has perpetually read 70-80mph the whole drive.

The car’s body is caked in dust and dirt, leaves, random bits of other foliage that’s floating in the air on the breeze. The tires, let’s not talk about the tires. Rowan rides into Oregon like he’s late for a wedding, tires squealing, knuckles white, eyes unblinking.

He doesn’t know what town he hits first, he only cares to watch the sun, keep his west and his east straight so he can find north. He continues north for a few hours, and stops in a town that was sleepy before the end of the world came. Now it’s just dead.

He pokes around, hands in his fur-lined coat pockets as he waltzes down streets and sidewalks like a forlorn tourist. It’s cold here, the sky is grey and rolling but quiet; tiny raindrops fall, just as grey and soft. The horizon is lined with thick pines, dark green and tall. Layer upon layer of them recede into the distance until they all bleed into one another, appearing like a smear of paint.

The wind cuts deep, and were he human, Rowan’s sure he’d be shivering. He splashes in puddles as he walks, ice cold water soaking the bottom of his jeans. He ducks into a post office, which is wholly untouched, same as the day as the military rolled in and ordered the city to evacuate.

It still astounds Rowan that towns haven’t been ransacked, that there are some standing as they once were. It makes him forget, just for a moment. But only for a moment. There’s a tiered shelf nailed into one of the walls above an uncomfortable looking bench.

As luck would have it there are maps in it. He spends a moment locating Apiary, then the river, and he leaves, turning the sign on the door.

‘Back in five’ it reads.

The rain has picked up, become more dedicated, grown in size, and he’s sopping wet before he makes it a block.

It’s so quiet aside from the rain, and everything is so grey. It’s easy to see her.

She’s hugging his peripherals, peering at him through the glass of a car window far to his right, but he sees her. Her bright red hair is hard to miss.

He takes to the middle of the road, heel-toeing his way back to the impala and keeping an ear out for her the whole way back. She’s quiet, bending her knees while she walks, but she hasn’t mastered matching silence with speed.

Rowan pays her no mind, not really. Even if she is the only other living thing in this town, he has-

A gun cocks.

He smirks faintly, eyes closing. Of course she’d do something stupid, she couldn’t just walk away.

Gone. He’s gone.

And back. Just a few feet behind her with his hands still in his pockets, and his shoulders relaxed. She’s stiff as a board half-crouched behind the hood of rusted BMW. She has a silencer screwed on to the end of her gun.

He admires her pragmatism. A gunshot around here would echo.

“Sorry about that. M’ a little gun shy.” He says.

She screams and jumps to her feet, turning in the process. Her drenched red locks whip in the wind, splattering him in the chest with water. Not that he notices: he’s already soaked to the bone.

“Two things, Red: Ya’ should wait before shooting someone- see what they ‘ave to offer. And two: don’t shoot before ya know what you’re dealing with.” He lectures, taking in her wide hazel eyes and open-mouthed gape. He cocks his head,

“What’re you followin’ me for?”

She splutters, “Y-you you’re- I-I uh.” Her gun shakes in her hands, low and pointed at the ground. She swallows. “People disappeared from my town. I thought you were…”

Rowan quirks a brow. “Disappeared?”

The girl nods. “Y-yeah. A while back, this guy shows up talking about- I don’t know, he was crazy- he had some kind of religious sales pitch and those that bought it left with him.” She breaks her gaze to look around town, her eyes a little vacant, perhaps remembering where people fit in.

“And those that didn’t…well, they just ended up disappearing into thin air, like they were never here to begin with.” She shivers, whether from the cold or the macabre it’s not clear.

Rowan shifts on his feet, narrows his eyes. “Where did he take them?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know. I never went. I used to try and follow…but eventually the town ran out of people and he stopped coming around.”

Rowan sighs, and takes his hands out of his pockets to swipe all his hair back. “Do ya’ remember what direction they left?”

“Y-yeah. North. They always headed north.”

Rowan nods firmly. “Right. Bye.” He brushes past her, spirits higher with the knowledge that he is headed in the right direction.

“Wait!” she yells at him.

No, no, he will not.

He lengthens his strides. But she just jogs.

“What are you going to do?” she gets in front of him, and walks backwards, gun in hand.

“Well, if ya’ must know I was plannin’ on buyin’ into that religious sales pitch.”

She gawks. “How?! You haven’t even heard it.”

He shrugs, and doesn’t tell her about the mailbox she’s about to run into. “Hey, if a whole town bought into it, it must be good.”

“The whole town didn’t!” she hisses, and opens her mouth to argue when she slams into something, hard. It jolts her, right into him.

He smiles, a hand wrapped around her upper arm. “Third piece of advice: watch where you’re goin’.”

She stares up at him, unamused. “You shouldn’t go, not alone.”

“No offense, but I think you’d just slow me down.” Rowan smirks at her angry frown. It reminds him of you, a little.

She glares. “You need someone to-“

“No, I don’t.” Rowan grins, when she glares harder, he rolls his eyes. “Fine. Ya’ know where Apiary is?” He doesn’t let her know that he knows exactly where it is.

Her frown lessens. “Yes.”

“Good. Can give me directions while I drive.” He releases her arm after pulling her away from the mailbox, and starts walking again. There are distant rumbles of thunder from somewhere beyond the horizon. It promises more rain, and lightning.

“So, Red, ya’ ‘ave a name?”

She huffs, and for a moment she doesn’t respond. She side-eyes him, drags her wet hair over one shoulder and says, “Rosa.”

It fits her. Rowan pops the collar on his jacket, water whips up his cheekbones from the drenched fur, and he’s anticipating the heat of the Impala. He parked not too far from the post-office, and he’s glad for that. He’s absolute shit at making conversation.

“How did you do it?” Rosa asks him, a crease between rusty-colored brows. She doesn’t look at him, she has her gaze fixed ahead.

“Do what?” Rowan queries in return, though he knows exactly what she’s alluding to. Her heart-rate is slightly elevated, she refuses to make eye-contact, her teeth are in her bottom lip. Rowan clocks in on her discomfort like a lion scenting fear.

Rosa opens her mouth. Closes it. She wipes a hand across her brow, blinks water out of her eyes and spots the car about a block away. She hesitates again, after looking at him, and once more when he pops a cigarette into his mouth.

He seems docile enough. “You disappeared…and then you-…” Rosa sighs at herself. Hearing the words out loud, she realizes how crazy it sounds, how crazy it _is._ “Well. You just reappeared.”

Rowan chuckles at her. But he doesn’t say anything. Not right away. He lets her stew on it. The rest of the way to the car he lets her doubt and chase questions around her own head. When the doors of the impala creak open is when he parts his lips.

“You’re not crazy.” He ducks in, fabric of his clothes squelching against the leather. It’s all rather cold and uncomfortable.

Rosa sinks down into her seat, a harder frown etched onto her face, it screams a question. But she doesn’t verbally ask it. They rumble out of town, the windshield wipers back and forth in front of her eyes, and heat blasting from the vents. Something rattles in one of them. Sounds like plastic.

They’ve been quiet, and she’s been sneaking glances, tapping her fingers on the grip of her gun in the holster on her side, thinking.

Rowan starts humming, a song from a while ago, one you used to sing all the time; it drove him nuts. Now it gives him calm. He glances at the radio, the cassette player above it and the tape inside that you’ve crammed full of your favorite songs. He smiles wanly.

Rosa can’t take the unknown any longer. “Ok, so.” She stops short, gathers her skepticism and some punch for the words, and Rowan raises his eyebrows, his head sort of turned in her direction. “You _did_ disappear, and then reappear…” Her lips are pursed flat.

Rowan wobbles a smile. “Is that a question or a statement?” Her expression falls flat. It doesn’t affect him. He points out the windshield. “Tour guide. Tell me: where are we?”

Rosa scoffs at him. But she looks out her window, watches trees pass by, glances up at the sky, looks out the left-hand side of the car. “About two hours south of Henley.”

Rowan waits for further elaboration, but Rosa chews her lip and then says, “How did you do it? I never took my eyes off you.”

Rowan’s pretty caramel colored orbs roll dramatically. “Where’s Henley?”

“Some sort of elaborate trick?” Rosa wipes her cheek, stray droplets rolling from her hair. She ignores his question because he ignored hers. “Have you been following me?”

Rowan sighs. “No tricks. Better things to do than stalk a mildly pretty woman in the pourin’ rain.” Rowan chuckles.

Rosa glowers at him, at his soft jab regarding her looks. “How?”

Rowan groans, rubs his closed hands around the width of the steering wheel and cuts his eyes towards her. “You wanna know? Fine.” Without warning, the locks on the car doors engage. All four of them.

Rosa snaps her head towards her door and grabs at the lock, and tries to pull it up. To no avail.

Rowan smiles. “Pay attention.” The cassette starts playing, buttons pressed, songs skipped, and Rosa watches with wide eyes. Rowan’s enjoying himself.

He stretches both arms, and laces his hands behind his neck. Rosa screeches at him,

“What are you doing?!” she reaches for the steering wheel only to stop short, her hands hovering uncertainly in mid-air. The wheel is turning on its own, making small adjustments for the road. Rosa glances out the windshield, making sure she isn’t completely crazy, making sure she isn’t going to die momentarily.

Rowan laughs heartily, and captures her attention. He watches her, her giant hazel eyes swimming in confusion, fear, worry, and he unwinds his hands from his neck. A gleeful smirk pulling his lips wide, he raises a hand and snaps his fingers in her face.

She flinches, her eyes wincing shut. In that short blink, Rowan played the final part of his show.

Rosa gawks, gapes. _His eyes,_ she thinks, _they’re black. But they can’t be._ She leans back into her door, forgetting to blink, to breathe.

Rowan winks at her. “There ya’ go. There’s your answer.” Rowan whistles along to the song bouncing around the cab of the car.

Rosa stammers. “W-wh-what are you?”

“You religious, Rosa?” Rowan asks conversationally.

Numbly, she shakes her head.

“Good, then we shouldn’t have any problems.” He taps according to the beat of the song, his hands thumping dully on the steering wheel. “Buckle up. It’s gonna be a ride.”

She goes silent, her eyes wide like saucers and stares blankly out the windshield as he whistles and hums. He doesn’t see it coming, and neither does she.

It comes barreling down a ramp like a roaring beast, thousands of pounds of heavy metal propelled by an explosion. The semi-truck crashes into them, spinning the car. Rosa blacks out immediately, but Rowan growls, obsidian eyes flitting past the mayhem, the glass, and debris and just barely sees the next hit coming.

It’s enough time. He considers it. For half a second.

But-

He reaches across the seat and grabs the collar of Rosa’s tweed coat and whisks them both away.

They disappear from the car the very second a bus slams into the driver’s side-door.

The landing is ungraceful. And awkward.

They tumble down a small incline littered with leaves and twigs and tiny rocks, and Rowan grapples any part of Rosa that he can reach. When he let go of her, he doesn’t remember.

His head bounces off a rock and he’s gone for a minute, seconds leaking away behind pain and fog and when he finally comes back to himself he’s on his back blinking up at a canopy of branches and leaves.

Earthy tang breaches his nostrils as well as the scent of rain, and a tiny current of iron. Hazily, he reaches up to touch his temple. His fingers come away red, but the wound’s already healed.

For a serene moment he lays there on the forest floor listening to the wind, the rain patter on foliage, the tweet of birds, the buzzing of bugs. And then he remembers.

He launches to his knees. “Rosa?” He hisses, swiveling his eyes to and fro.

“What?” Comes a pained grunt from behind him, and Rowan wheels around, balancing on his heels.

Rosa half lifts herself, her arms a little shaky, and jabs a knee into the wet earth. “What the Hell just happened?” she asks, wobbling. Idly, she raises a trembling hand to her already sore neck- the impact gave her whiplash.

Rowan opens his mouth, but he stops to listen. There’s yelling from behind him, back on the road. Apparently, their strange escape has been noticed. He strains his hearing as hard as he can. The ambushers are angry, confused, desperate from carnality. But they are human.

Rowan contemplates going back to kill them, but as Rosa stumbles to her feet and sways back and forth he leaves the idea by the wayside. Sparing a glance behind him and seeing no one approaching over the incline, Rowan shoots to his feet and starts towards Rosa.

He grabs her arm and tugs her after him, her feet are clumsy and she’s protesting that she needs a minute. “We don’t ‘ave time for you to get yer land-legs back.” He interrupts, and breaks into a jog, practically dragging her.

Rosa’s vision is blurry and her legs feel like cement, but she’s so out of it she forgets the fact that Rowan isn’t human and that she should be scared of him.

It happens out of nowhere.

A gunshot rings out into the forest, echoing for miles around, scattering birds into the air and startling smaller animals.

Rosa screams, from the fright, and from the pain.

Rowan hears the bullet, heard every millisecond of its travel through the air, but he hears it tear through flesh and muscle and ricochet off bone before splintering out of the front of Rosa’s right shoulder. She staggers forward, slumping like a top-heavy doll, and Rowan curses through gritted teeth.

Another gunshot, Rowan can hear the trigger click.

He transports the two of them a few feet away and the bullet embeds itself in the thick trunk of a pine tree, shattering the bark into splinters. Another gunshot, and Rowan pays it no mind: it comes nowhere near them.

But Rowan loops an arm around Rosa’s waist, and throws her left arm around his shoulders despite her groan of pain. There are multiple people up on the bank, those with rifles take their time aiming, and the others with smaller guns take off after Rowan and Rosa, firing at will.

“Who the fuck are these guys?” Rosa grunts, dragging her feet as fast as she can.

“Doesn’t matter.” Rowan hisses, heaving Rosa a little more upright. “See that rock?” He asks her, and Rosa squints.

It’s big, it’s more of a boulder, round and smooth and tall as it is. “Yeah.”

“Good. Stay-“ He teleports, much to the surprise and unwillingness of Rosa. He dumps her against the rock, and takes off around the side of it. “-here.” He says and is gone.

Rosa huffs, and fumbles for her handgun at her thigh. She’s shaking from adrenaline, from pain, and from fear. But she grips it firmly, and wrestles herself into a crouch and readies for whatever may come.

But she doesn’t have to be ready for anything. There’s gunfire, seconds and seconds of gunfire, and garbles of screams cut-off suddenly. Bodies thump, and leaves rustle, bullets pierce the ground, trees, and the rock Rosa is hiding behind.

It seems like an eternity lasts while she waits for the silence, but she knows it can’t be more than at least ten seconds. Footsteps approach, soft and measured, and Rosa bristles in anticipation.

And then whistling. Whistling the same tune from the car ride. Rosa sighs.

“Don’t shoot. I come in peace.” Rowan hums as he rounds the stone, a giddy smile on his face.

Rosa stares up him.

Rowan’s jacket is spattered with blood, the hem dripping with it, and his pants are stained dark red. His face is speckled with drops of crimson, a few trail down his stubbly neck. But he seems so docile with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders loose.

“You alright?” Rowan asks her. And she gets the feeling it isn’t because he cares, but just because he knows she’s shell-shocked and he wants to play with that.

“They’re all dead?” Rosa stands unsteadily, putting her handgun back in its holster.

Rowan leans on his heels to peer around the boulder, whistling. He grins, “Looks like it.”

Rosa pushes the impossibility of it from her mind, and whatever carnage that she fortunately didn’t have to witness, and says, “Now what? The car’s ruined.”

Rowan kicks up a small spray of leaves. “We walk.” He points northwest, “Better get to it.”

Rosa sighs again but is at least grateful that northwest takes them away from the scene beyond this boulder. She rests a hand on her gun, and begins walking, her eyes on the ground as she frees bits of leaves and tiny twigs from her still wet hair.

Rowan wipes his face in the collar of his jacket and watches Rosa’s back. Literally. He questions why he’s here, why she’s with him. He questions what he’s doing, questions- not for the first time -what he is exactly.

Sometimes, he feels so human it makes his skin crawl. Like right now.

He drags a hand through his copper-locks, and ruffles all his hair at the nape of his neck. A twig snaps behind him and he whirls, onyx eyes narrowed. He scans back and forth but can find nothing, after a few moments, he turns. He has words of warning on his lips, to keep a sharp eye and watch where she steps, but he stops short.

Rosa is pinned to the chest of some man wearing a heinously long red scarf. He has an arm wrapped around the front of her shoulders leisurely, no tenseness in the limb.

Rowan frowns, disappointed in himself that someone got the jump on him. But he’s ready to fight this new person.

“I’d advise you not to do something foolish.” Comes a soft, flat voice from behind him, and Rowan peers over his shoulder.

This other intruder is unusual. Long white hair but a young appearance and an authority about him…

Rowan senses one more, just a moment before he reveals himself.

“So, this is the guy, huh? That isn’t Y/N…right?” This one is tall and slender and all elegance and dark grace.

Angels, Rowan thinks in dread. Powerful ones too.

“No.” The one with white hair says, and tilts his head. “Curious. It would seem Y/N had quite the bond with this…thing.” His voice drips with subtle venom on the last word, his eyes locked on Rowan.

Rowan wonders who these angels are and how they know you, but firstly, he wonders what’s going to happen, and how he’s going to survive if things go bad.

Maalik interjects, somewhat thoughtfully. “He wasn’t always. Someone turned him.”

Le takes a step forward. “Doesn’t matter. Y/N isn’t here, this girl is insignificant.” He shrugs, tossing a curtain of midnight hair out of his face. “We take the demon and go.”

Rowan sighs. He was so close to the compound, and now…

The two angels behind him start forward in unison, and Rosa, thinking she’s about to see something terrible, turns her head away. But Rowan captures her attention,

“Find Apiary, go a few miles north, it’s close to a river.” Rowan makes no promises to see her again, he doesn’t reassure her that anything will be okay. He just gives her direction, gives her purpose.

The white-haired and dark-haired angels grasp him by the shoulders and they take him away. The one restraining Rosa disappears as well, leaving her alone in the suddenly eerie quiet of the forest.

Rosa stands numbly, staring at the space Rowan was in just a few minutes ago, and then she drops to her knees.

The wind whistles and hums, rustling leaves until everything sounds like the rushing of water and birds begin chirping again.

It’s many minutes before Rosa picks herself up and heads northwest. And she does so wishing that Rowan was with her.


	8. Fill In The Blanks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You've found yourself in a pickle with no help and no exit. You're on your own, and losing it. Time has escaped your grip, there's just the running, the fear of almost being caught, the adrenaline crash and rise of avoiding capture, and harsh despair as it starts all over again. We all have limits, and you've been driven to yours. That's not necessarily a bad thing, though. You're becoming a little more familiar with this power inside you and who it belongs to, and somehow, that doesn't scare you half as much as Dean.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a long time on this story, and I'm sorry, the inspiration just wasn't there. I got kind of burned out on this story, but i assure you, it will get finished. Promise. After a long hiatus on Crossroads i come back with a mindfuckery chapter that makes no sense. You're goddamn welcome. Love you!

Date ?? Time ??

 

You don’t know how long you’ve been here, how many near misses you’ve had, but you’re losing it. Slowly, but surely.

The town repeats, it bleeds, and then reforms like soft clay. And everything is white, grey, black, and various shades of blue, unmoving and stale underneath a speeding sky of crimson and pink-tinted clouds.

Your arms are sore, your legs haven’t stopped shaking and your lungs _burn_. Time doesn’t mean anything here, and sometimes neither does sound.

It loops: the reoccurrence of noise. For a while everything is dead-silent, as if someone has pressed MUTE on the world. Other times the echoes resound for minutes at a time and overlap- footsteps stuttering and breaking off, your ragged breathing, Dean’s animalistic growls, the list goes on.

Right now you’re crouched in a tiny alley between a house and a dental office, a dumpster at your back as you watch down the opposite end of the alley, ready for him to appear at any moment like he’s done in the past.

He’d appear suddenly, taking you by surprise and then you’d run, and he’d chase you. Get so close you could smell his natural scent and then he’d altogether disappear at the last minute, when the panic became palpable and you couldn’t breathe.

And you’d spend a few minutes on the verge of tears before taking off again.

It’s happened so many times you’ve lost count. Blearily, you peer overhead and watch the clouds zoom past wondering if it’s been days here, or weeks, or if it’s all just one long agonizing moment stretched out into forever.

You close your eyes and shake your head. You don’t even know where you are, you don’t even know if you’re alive. You’re just lost and scared, and tired. If everything didn’t feel so real you’d think you’re having a vivid nightmare.

You feel it crawl up your spine like a snake with all the charm and embroidered chivalry of a red silk ribbon. He’s found you again.

You open your eyes and he’s there, standing at the end of the alley with his arms by sides and his legs spread wide. There aren’t shadows, but you’re sure if there were his would reach you. He doesn’t move, and neither do you.

You’re not sure you can. The terror is hidden but present, like the sting of a papercut takes the backburner when you scrape your knee. You know it would be bad for him to catch you, but you’ve escaped so many times and endured the unknown for so long that you find a sliver of complacency in the repeated scenario.

But he takes a step into the alley, and it claws at you- the fear.

It urges you to stand, and so you do.

It’s quiet, muted to an uncomfortable silence, you almost want to hear the pounding of your heart, anything to distract you from him.

The black button up he has rolled to his elbows is a stark contrast to the cold grey of the buildings on either side of him. The t-shirt he’s wearing underneath is red like the sky and it makes you think of blood.

You can’t help but think it’ll be your blood that paints some part of this eerie landscape as red as his shirt. There’s some part of you, from way back when, before you killed people with the bare excuse of survival as your absolution from the act itself, before you watched people you loved die, before you lost _everything_ , there’s this part of you that wonders what he was like- before.

But it doesn’t really matter you muse as you run, who he was before no longer exists. And the conditions that made him into who he is…well, they’re the same ones that made you who you are. Everyone’s circumstances are the same, what isn’t the same is how they react.

You could close your eyes. You could. You know this town like the back of your hand by now, and you know that it’s your prison.

All the doors are locked, and the windows highly reflective and midnight black. There are shapes to things, but not details and definition. You can tell a truck is a truck but you can’t tell what make and model it is, you can’t tell if there are scratches on it, or what color it really is, you can’t discern what’s inside vehicles because the glass is pitch black and reflects the world back on itself.

_Find your way back._

The words come to you, as you pass between a street pole and a trashcan, and it’s a niggling feeling, deep inside you that leads you to head out of town.

You’re not sure what you expect: every other time you fled this tiny town you’ve simply arrived a few minutes later exactly the way you left. It was like a mobius strip on a time delay.

You pass the town’s sign, blank and white, and hurdle on down the road that’s a gritty grey, dark blue lines flit underneath your sneakers, formally yellow, but in this abstract world nothing makes coherent sense.

It’s rare for you to make it this far without feeling needles at your back, without feeling dread and horror pool in your stomach like cold acid. You chance a peek behind you and feel equal parts fear and relief at not seeing Dean tear after you.

The scenery fades, objects slowly become sparse until everything recedes into grey. The clouds shoot past you above and it makes you feel like you aren’t making any progress, the end of the road adds to that feeling.

It’s tempting to stop, to consider returning to the town because at least the town is familiar, at least there’s somewhere to hide in the town. Here it’s just open and he can see you, you wouldn’t be surprised if he was watching you right now.

The thought makes your breath hitch.

Suddenly, your view changes as if a switch has been flipped.

The color grey is gone, as well as blue. Black, white, and red remain.

 The ground has become inky, pitch dark and just like the windows back in town it reflects. Your upside down reflective doppelganger has no defining features, she’s opaque and white, and soft looking. There’s a building ahead of you, it rings in you with familiarity, but somehow you can’t remember what it is.

It matches the sky: blood red.

You don’t think it wise to go in….

But you don’t have a choice-

A shudder winds its way up your spine and the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end. You don’t have to turn around to know he’s there, the feeling is enough. Even before the church, before this strange world, you had always thought he had a strong presence; he’s impossible to ignore, whether it’s from sheer size, his gruff demeanor, the demand of compliance that oozes from him, or the danger underlying every one of his actions- you can’t say. Perhaps it’s a little bit of everything.

In any case, Dean’s always put you on edge, but here- this version of him threatens hysterics from you.

You pound up a set of rickety steps, dust billowing slowly in milky clouds like food coloring in water. The doors are heavy, so heavy you think they might be locked and the thought makes your eyes tear up. But you shove your shoulder into the wood, once, twice, and it creaks open, echoing eerily.

You tumble in and slam the door shut, chest heaving with your palms pressed to the wood as an extra measure to keep him out.

For just a few short seconds you stand there breathing in musty air, staring at the doors and straining your hearing for his footsteps on the porch outside when you realize…

You’re inside a building. And it’s real. There’s no heavily contrasted colors, or strange echoes, you can hear your heartbeat, wood creaking, the building itself sighing. Feeling a smidge of relief for something that makes sense, you turn, ready to face your new surroundings when your courage, your hope, any sense of a plan evaporates from you.

You know this place-

The ceiling is high, steepled and supported by thick wooden beams that have seen better days.

-Know it inside and out.

A ragged red rug, faded in color, runs down the middle of the aisle all the way to the altar. Light filters through the windows, high on the walls, and dust motes float lazily by.

Your knees shake, and your chest constricts in warning of an oncoming panic attack.

How can you be here? In the church? And why- this is the last place you want to be!

Knuckles rap softly on the other side of the door, and you feel everything narrow down to this moment, like finality. The words THE END, flash across your vision and your mind, there is no future, there’s just this: the gloomy church, your clammy hands, and his sickeningly sweet chuckle muffled through inches of wood.

“You gonna let me in, or am I gonna have to huff and puff?” he coos, tap-tap-tapping on the door.

You think it accurate: that he’s playing the part of the wolf, and you’re the helpless pig.

You scurry away from the door, and in your haste knock over a standing candelabra. You wince as it crashes and clatters noisily, but you scream when Dean’s gentle knocks turn into pounding.

Dust clouds around the hinges and frame of the doors and you back-peddle slowly, watching with wide eyes. You know he’s toying with you, if he wanted in, he’d already be in. The knowledge makes you shiver and shake like the doors he’s beating on.

They rattle in protest, creaking and groaning, and you count the tortuous seconds, wondering when time will run out. It can’t be long, considering how old everything is, how warped and run-down it all is.

Pews flank both your sides and the entrance is cloaked in shadows, the outline of the doors barely visible, if not for all the dust bursting from them you wouldn’t know they were there. Dull light beams cut diagonally across the aisle at intervals and you slip between them, ignoring the futility of your pointless retreat.

You reach the first row when it all goes quiet, as silent as the beginning moments of a funeral, and you take in the musty smell of the air, the cold sweat running down your neck, the darkened corners of the room and part your lips, fancying the idea of a prayer.

A violent rumble is torn from the doors, a harsh kick that makes you shrink back with hunched shoulders.

He’s serious now.

You can tell just from the echo. You flit your eyes along the floor, looking for anything you can use as a weapon, but everything’s the same as the first time you were here: there’s nothing. Even so, you take to the floor on hands and knees, peering underneath pews.

Another blow and you hear the wood crack and splinter, you grit your teeth and ignore the way your hands quiver. You’re running out of time. You dive down onto your stomach when you cross the aisle having left the other rows of pews empty-handed.

The doors groan again, and you hear the distinctive hollow sound of wood break.

Dust makes you cough and your eyes water, but you look. And after finding nothing, you look some more, in denial. You steadfastly ignore the fact that the pew above your head is where you remember Castiel sitting on that day.

But, the memory is there, and you wheeze out a watery groan.

You wish he was here, you wish he could just show up and rescue you from this living nightmare. You think of his immaculately clean trench coat, and his perpetually backwards tie, and you think of his subtle mannerisms that accompany his confusion and you laugh, tears in the sound.

You miss him.

There’s a silence again, and you know this is last one you’ll get. Sniffling, you climb to your feet and turn, intending to search the pulpit when the choice is ripped from you altogether.

The doors don’t break. They explode.

It’s one thunderous roar of despair, a cacophony of splintering wood and a thousand little snaps followed by bigger repercussions of planks being blown inwards. The hinges break off and fly into the room, bouncing across the floor amid the flying debris.

You’re frozen dead at the end of the rug, riveted to the spot in terror with your eyes fixed on the vague shape of him standing at the threshold. Dust floats around him, and the background, the outside is completely dark, there’s no light, no horizon.

Time is suspended, stretched out into a million seconds between this moment that you fear and the fear of the next moment.

You’re frozen, until he isn’t.

“Knock, knock, Y/N.” His voice is quiet, but lack of volume does nothing to take the edge off it and it feels almost like his voice reaches across the distance to strangle you, because you can’t speak.

It’s here. It’s upon you: your biggest fear, and you’re in no way prepared to face it.

His boots thud on the floor, sounding like a judge’s gavel in your ears. You’ve half a mind- barely half -to plead, or negotiate, but your tongue is stricken dead in your mouth. For a while now he’s just been a mass of contrasted colors in a world of contrasted colors, the depth of his black shirt, the richness of his red t-shirt underneath were all you could discern before.

But now, now you can see the faded blue of his jeans, his dirty boots, his tan skin streaked with dirt, his piercing green eyes that are as cold as ice. You stumble back a few steps as he advances down the aisle and the air gets sucked from you.

Not only that but the room appears to be getting smaller. You dart your frantic gaze toward _the room_ and feel bile rise in your throat. And then you look at the other room, and wonder if your chances are better there, but…

There’s no door.

Your back hits the pulpit, and you’ve nowhere to go. Nowhere except _there_ , and you don’t want to move, even if the prospect is little different.

The building groans brokenly, and glass cracks, just a quiet little noise that escapes your notice because you’re busy thinking about bolting out the church doors. It’s dark outside, dark enough that you won’t be able to see and there’s no direction to go, but you don’t want to be here.

Dean’s taking his sweet time walking down the aisle, watching you with leisurely contempt. A wolf approaching cornered prey.

The church plays against you, much like the landscape has been doing for whatever stretch of time you’ve been trapped. Simultaneously, all the stain glass windows burst inwards, shards of red, blue, white, grey and black glass shower down into the sanctuary. And the beams above snap and crack ominously, all the warning there is before the roof begins caving in.

You watch in stunted horror-mixed-awe as planks rain down and clatter, as thick wooden beams pummel the pews, and glass falls like snow to cover the floor. You watch as he walks, unaffected, through all of it, mayhem missing him by scant inches.

The ceiling gapes, revealing nothing but the color black beyond, and when the floor shakes underneath your feet, you glance at _the room_ with foreboding and dread. The door to it swings open easily, revealing an untouched interior, perfectly immaculate and you swallow hard.

A section of roof plummets towards you and make a decision to run. To run back to this room where your nightmares stem from.

You leave the chaos behind you as the church falls to ruin, glass crunching under your feet and dust clouding your vision. You glimpse behind you and see him standing near the pulpit, his arms limp at his sides and his bow-legs spread wide in stance. His lips are stretched with a smirk that speaks of ill intent, and shadows from falling debris shift over his face and shoulders, but you’re certain.

You’re certain his eyes aren’t green.

You turn your head, and tumble into the room with all the grace of a newly born deer and slam right into the desk, losing your breath. You don’t like this view, so you face the door, face the shambled church, and face him, watching you.

The colors begin to shift, the world bleeds back into the abstract. All the wood is white, all the shattered glass, red, and everything is black.

Without warning, the door slams shut, cutting you off from visible fear.

The noise disappears, as well as the scent of dust and must. It’s so quiet your ears ring, and your heart, your heart is beating so fast you can almost feel it hitting your ribcage. Seconds pass as you stare at the door, as you wait for something to happen, as you wait to see if you will make something happen.

_“Jasper Hemmingway…he- like you -was pure…Don’t try to deny it. You may not know me, but. I. Know. You.”_

You grasp the edge of the desk behind you and lean on it, eyes glued to the door.

_“I wanted nothing but to destroy him. I hated him just like I hated everyone else I was forced to co-exist with. He had no idea I was there. None of them ever do until near the end.”_

The words come back to you, words you’ve heard in the deepest recesses of your mind, words you’ve _felt_ spoken to you more than you’ve actually heard them. And you clutch at them, clutch at them desperately.

_“And he knew. I knew the moment he did and the horror he felt- the fear…it’s like a drug for me.”_

You squint, fingers curling around the lip of the desk, footsteps can be heard beyond the door but you’re running over the words of that monologue. Combing it back and forth for some kind of meaning.

_“You may not know me, but. I. Know. You.”_ Subconsciously, you rest a hand at the lower curve of your ribcage.

_“I wanted to destroy him. I hated him just like I hated everyone else…”_ You pick out the meat of the sentences, you’re clawing for meaning, and avoiding the undeniable. There are two soft knocks at the door.

_“The horror he felt- the fear…it’s like a drug for me.”_ You squint a little harder at the choice of words. The change in verb tense: the response to fear hasn’t changed for this strange entity. It’s a drug to him. Still.

You can start to see a picture come together, little lines creating shapes and you close your eyes to better concentrate. More knocking, more gentle knocking. You read between the lines.

_“I want to destroy you. I hate you. The fear, your fear, it’s a drug to me. You may not know me, but I know you. I **know what you fear.** ” _

The door swings open, and it’s quiet, and you’re calm. Because this- this is real, but it isn’t genuine, it’s like holding a copy of an original painting. Real, but not authentic.

“Y/N.” It isn’t smug, or mocking, or deceitfully sweet. Merely curious. It doesn’t sound like Dean. With your eyes closed you don’t get the same feeling. What you do feel is raw power, ancient strength and sharp wisdom. You feel disaster and destruction, you sense a hatred millennium of years strong and you know it isn’t Dean.

“Clever little peon.” This feels different. The voice. It’s…alluring, but in such a way that gives you pause. “Finding the true meaning, seeing through the fog and the mirrors.”

You ease your eyes open and come face-to-face with him. Or close to him anyway. He’s still using Dean’s appearance, but there’s a shimmer around the edge of him, like the air is quivering in heat waves. And his eyes…they’re red. But not all the way through, they shimmer and glow like flame on gems or light on whiskey.

They’re flecked with lighter shades of red near the pupil, and then the color darkens near the rim of the iris to crimson. They’re strong, these eyes of his, and you do believe they see right through you.

He cocks his head to the side a little and regards you. “But not completely. You can’t see me, not truly.”

“What was the point of this?” You ask, wary, and not at all over the fear and terror. It is still very much there.

He smiles. “I told you. I don’t want you to make this easy for me. I want you to fight me with all the strength your feeble existence can muster.” He crosses his arms over his chest and tips his chin up at you. “I didn’t think you’d stop running.”

You hold his gaze. “Ran out of places to go.”

He’s thoughtful, immobile, and then he grins wider. “But you didn’t disappoint in the end. Insignificant as it was, you grappled for meaning in your desperation, and you found it.” He walks towards you letting his arms fall at his sides, your shoulders stiffen and his eyes glimmer with the notice of it,

“Not everyone does. Most people just accept fear for all its irrationality and never question why it’s there to begin with.” His approach is slow, languid, and he appears harmless, his actions obscure. “You knew this world- my world -was madness. Nothing made sense, and you were in a loop of irrationality. The fear was there, but it wasn’t concrete. _That-_ “ he points over his shoulder with his thumb, alluding to the church.

“ _That_ was real. That was all you, I didn’t do that, which brings us to here. Let me ask you…” He’s in front of you, practically on your toes and you crane your neck to peer into his fathomless orbs of smoldering hellfire.

He leans down, bracing his hands beside yours on the desk, and murmurs, almost a purr. “Have you ever felt fear like it?”

You swallow roughly around the lump in your throat, and open your mouth to respond. But he stands tall and looks down at you, a gleam in his eye that says he knows your answer.

“You’re not simply afraid of him…you are undone by him.”

You shake your head, denying the obvious truth. “I don’t- I hate him.”

“The hate is made to cover the fear,” he quirks a brow at you, unimpressed by your response. “But in any case, you’ve shattered my castle of mirrors.” He frowns at you as if in scolding, and you can’t find it in yourself to give a shit, which he knows.

“Y/N, you just may be worth my time after all,” He muses with a border-line fond smile. “I’ll let you prove me right and leave you with a parting gift.” He gives you no chance to contemplate, or to move before he has your chin in hand and presses his lips to your forehead.

Your eyes widen, mostly in surprise, but-

There’s a hum inside you, archaic and earthy, and it crackles in your blood like sparks. It soothes you, but it also incenses you, makes you feel strong. Without realizing it, you’ve closed your eyes, and you think yourself crazy to do something so reckless.

You snap your eyes open and immediately shut them again against the brightness. You slap a hand over your eyes and breathe. It hits you on your third inhale: rain, and wet grass, the bitter tang of soggy earth, and the smooth scent of a fire.

Warily, you sneak your eyes open and take in your new surroundings slowly. It appears you’re in a cabin of some sort, if the animal skin rugs and mounted deer heads mean anything. You’re in a bed, piled with blankets and pillows and the bedthings smell like heady smoke as well as some kind of spice.

Candles are lit here and there and a fire roars in a fireplace on the opposite side of the room. Ratty curtains are drawn back to allow in light, and you see an overcast sky, and window panes dotted with water. But you’re just so happy to see the real sky, to see clouds practically stationery that you almost cry on the spot.

Your eyes fall on him last, standing as still as he is in the open doorway of the cabin with his back to you. But it’s a relief to see him nonetheless, you feel starved for his company, you feel starved just for his existence.

It hits a chord in you that he’s here. With you. That he hasn’t left you during whatever the Hell happened to you. It makes your heart palpitate and your throat constrict.

You don’t know what you’ve done to earn his loyalty, to earn his faith in you, but you’re so glad he thinks there’s something worthy about you.

He seems pensive, his head turned upward to peer into the sky, and you almost feel bad for interrupting. But at the moment, you don’t really care.

So, you pull yourself up on your elbows, and slip out from underneath the covers, not feeling the coolness in the air, or the chill of the floor. And you don’t realize how quiet you’re walking now, all you can focus on is the distance between you and the trench-coated angel and how it’s simply too much.

You’re a few feet away, close enough to count the wrinkles around his shoulders and elbows in the fabric of his coat, and you grin with watery eyes. You can’t help the smile in your voice,

“Castiel.”

He stiffens, barely. But you see it. He doesn’t turn fast, doesn’t spin in surprise or zeal. But he is glad. His head turns before his body, and by the time he’s facing you he’s already sporting a relieved expression that gives new depths to his ocean blue eyes.

“Y/N.” He greets you, a tiny smile on his lips.

You all but throw yourself at him, and he’s prepared for it, had maybe even been hoping for it. He’s not the least bit awkward when he returns the embrace, there’s an assurance in the way his arms loop around your shoulders, and something that feels like home when he rests a cheek on top of your head.

And there’s something distinctly heart-warming about the fact that his coal-black wings bend around to encircle you. You feel a feather brush your back, and smile harder. You keep it to yourself, this new sight you’ve been gifted, and burrow further into his embrace, foolhardy enough to believe that your troubles dissipate with his presence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meh, felt like this chapter was meh. But i had to get it out. Y'all ready for more Castiel and reader cuteness? Cause I am. I've missed their dynamic. Missed this story, but the muse wasn't ready for it. Love to you all!


	9. Class Is In Session

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You're not a fan of these episodes you have. You've had quite enough of these impromptu naps, and macabre meetings with even more macabre beings. Now awake, and with this 'parting gift', you feel different and the world feels different, and you'd be lying to say that you're ready to get back out there. There seems to be an interlude happening, a quiet pause, and you intend to take it. If Castiel wants to stay a few days in the cabin and teach you the ins and outs of monsters and what have you, you'll gladly acquiesce.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bonjour! It's meee! This story is still alive. I haven't given up on it, I promise. Not a whole happening here, just Castiel being worried and mother henning you like usual, and you and this 'being' having a short interaction. More to come.

May 1st

 

“So, what happened?”

Castiel glances at you askance in silent retort to your question. He’s standing at the edge of the rug near the fireplace, an arm laying across the empty mantle, and the fire plays hauntingly on his irises, sparking them bright, and then ghosting them dark when the flames themselves struggle for life.

“You disappeared.” Castiel rakes his gaze along the dusty mantle, he drags a fingertip through the thick layer lazily.

You blink incredulously, and scoff. “Yeah. Kinda worked that out. Waking up in a cabin I have no recollection of entering was a dead giveaway.”

Castiel’s lips purse flatly, and he sighs. “Well, you could at least apologize for disappearing.”

You plant your hands on the back of the pleather couch and roll your weight into them. Your gaze is locked on his face, but…behind him you can see his wings scrunch and curl tightly to his back. The motion is all nervousness and insecurity.

“Sure, okay,” you agree, your brows very slightly knit in unease, he can see it, barely. “You wanna answer some questions first, though?”

The fire pops and crackles fiercely, the flames dancing wildly as they catch on drier parts of the log. Cinders tumble from the rack and sparks float up into the chimney. Outside, rain threatens again, but the threat is light, unlikely to become true.

Castiel doesn’t want to answer questions first. “Alright,” he tucks his free hand into his coat pocket, and peers down into the fire.

“How long was I…gone, or whatever?”

Castiel closes his eyes, “How specific do want me to be with my answers?”

Your fingers curl into the couch cushions and your biceps waver with sudden anxiety. “Spare no details.” It feels you’ve hammered a nail into the lid of a coffin, but…you’re watching his wings twitch, primary feathers flicking in mild agitation…so, nails, hammer, coffin.

“You were physically missing for 48 hours. You’ve been unconscious for 6 days.” Castiel observes in his peripherals, listening to your heart pump blood, listening to it speed up, slow down, skip beats. He watches your eyes fall to the rug, watches that furrow in your brow deepen.

“Why was I unconscious?” your teeth dig into your bottom lip, your fingers puncture through the fake leather of the cushions, a soft ‘pop!’ alerts you and Castiel both of your anxiousness. Sheepishly, you retract your hands and shove them into your jeans pockets.

“You were dangerous.” Castiel’s eyes bore into you from across the room and they track you steadily as you meander on the outskirts of the living room’s furniture. “Did you meet him?”

_Red eyes of different hue, flecked with burnt orange and pupils as dark as pitch black. A shimmering, wavering cloak of presence and power._

Your shoulders shiver involuntarily, “Yeah. He’s a treat.” Your tongue has gone dry, and your midsection drops in abject rejection. You absentmindedly scratch at your ribcage.

“In terms you can understand…you’re sharing head-space with him,” Castiel’s monotone delivery, along with its redundancy, has you frowning a sardonic smile.

“More than that though, right?” You stop at an end table and bend down at the hip to scrutinize a stuffed robin.

“Yes. You also contain his soul,”

You sigh, watching your face pinch in the reflection of this stuffed bird’s beady black eyes, and you turn your head to look at Cas. “Is that even possible? Two souls in one body?”

“It isn’t my design,” is his way of saying he doesn’t know, not completely. He drops his arm off the mantle, “But-” he flops a hand in your general direction as elaboration, his face as flat as ever.

You nod, and flop down into an armchair, dust motes billowing up from the neglected furniture, and you cross one leg over the other, “You have the book with you, right?”

Castiel’s wings hike up, and twitch nervously, and then they drop right back in, tight and rigid, “Yes, but I believe it a good idea to keep you and it separated,” He stares at your profile, your eyelashes beating down on your cheekbones as you blink a few times, and your tongue darts out to whet your lips,

“I think you may be right about that.” You’re in no hurry to lay your hands on the cold leather of that cursed thing, considering what happened the last time.

“Do you have any more questions?” Castiel ponders, warmth licking at his hand. The fire has died down to tiny flames and glowing embers.

“Can you- can you read my mind anymore?”

The question throws him off guard and he’s silent for a moment, watching you contemplate your dirty shoelaces and the scuffed toe of your sneaker.

“No,” he answers, head slightly cocked, “It’s been closed to me since you disappeared.” Which he found understandable but no less worrying. The seal was weakening, so your unruly tenant was gaining more power.

Again, you nod, but this time your eyes are far away, and your teeth bite at the inside of your cheek. “Okay, I’m out of questions for now.”

“Well,” Castiel glances at the cabin door. It’s still open, and slightly chilly air pours in, but neither you or him feel the effects. Nevertheless, he shuts it from across the room and then turns from his place at the mantle to face you.

When you look at him and quirk a brow, he tepidly folds his arms over his chest.

“You can apologize for disappearing now.”

You’d laugh if he wasn’t serious. You roll your eyes, but a small smile works its way onto your face, “Sorry. I’ll try not to make it a habit.”

His eyes light with humor, and crinkle with the smile he shoots you. His wings unfurl but stay close to his body, relaxed but unable to stretch in the small space.

You suddenly feel sorry for all the places you’ve picked to shack up for nights, for the buildings you drag him into. His wings have to constantly ache.

“So, where are we, anyway?” you ask, looking around the room again. Everything is wood paneling and duck pictures, and fur and dead things, and it makes you cringe.

“Cottonwood Falls. Well, a five minutes drive from it.” He stands at the window and stares out the rain-spotted panels into the thick forest laying 30 feet away. A thin path is cut through the trees, marked with stakes shoved into the ground. “Kansas.”

It isn’t lost on him that he told Sam and Dean where you two are. He’s torn in half. He wants to meet with Sam and Dean, to convince them they are wrong about you. He wants to smooth things between you and Dean, he wants the impossible.

He wants to reunite you with your friends, who he knows are travelling with Sam and Dean. He wants you to win against the evil inside you. He wants the world back to the way it was.

“Hey, why do you walk everywhere with me if you can just fly?”

“I have to keep an eye on you,” He says like it’s the most obvious thing, and throws you a look over his shoulder, squinty eyes and flattened lips drive his thought straight to you without words, _what a silly question._

“Right, okay.” You roll your lips into your mouth, your eyebrows high, and uncross your legs. “So, before I disappeared, or whatever, where we were headed to look for this angel?”

“The thing about this angel, Y/N,” Castiel leaves his vigil at the window to sit down across from you on the couch, “You don’t find him unless he wants to be found.”

You don’t miss a beat. “Oh, that’s fu-” Castiel gives you a flat look “That’s just great.” You finish, your facial features flat-lining. “Let’s hope he’s in a helpful mood then.” You cross your arms over your chest and throw your head back.

“He will be,” Castiel assures you, his expression serious. “This is the first time in a very long time that Raziel has been needed.” Rain patters quietly on the windows, softly, as if hesitant to interrupt, and Castiel watches a few drops splatter on the glass before he draws his deep blues back to you.

“The last sighting of Raziel-”

“What, someone’s actually seen this guy?” you interrupt, and sit up straight, your hands landing on your knees.

“-stop interrupting me. Yes. It’s been a long time, but the last time he was seen was near this place.”

“Huh,” You lean forward, elbow on your knee and prop your chin in your hand, “Talk about convenient.”

“Perhaps,” Castiel shrugs, tilts his head with the motion, “Or, he’s in a helpful mood.”

Impatient stars break through the atmosphere and twinkle behind thin clouds, signaling the approach of night. Insects and bugs buzz and flit about, and call to eachother in all manners of conversation. A few bids sing to one another, reluctant to accept the day’s close.

You know how they feel. After sleeping for almost a week you’re loathe to sit around, but-

“It’s almost nightfall.” Castiel informs needlessly, and you watch in faded appreciation as the curtains close seemingly of their own regard, “We should stay in.”

You don’t disagree. But you glance over at Castiel sat on the middle of a couch and his wings struggling to find a comfortable span.

“Sure you don’t want to stretch your wings?” you ask him lightly, and he squints at you inquisitively, so you continue, “If I know you, and I like to think that I do- a little -then you spent the last six days in this room ‘keeping an eye on me’.”

Castiel stares at you silently, and his wings shift a little more, popping up a few inches as if preparing for lift, but his jaw is stubbornly set.

“C’mon, I’m not going anywhere. Fly to Malaysia, it’ll take you a second. Dust off your wings, Cas.” You encourage him with a gentle smile that’s all concern and friendly advice.

Castiel sighs, seemingly long-suffering about it, but you can see his wings quiver in anticipation. He pins you with a stern look. “Two seconds. And then I return, and neither one of us leaves this cabin.”

“Yes. Okay, go.” You’re beaming with laughter and glee, and you wave a hand him, shooing him away.

He disappears from view, and you’re left alone in the dark of the cabin, the fire casting eerie shadow and red glow on splintered wood and faded cloth. Time feels different now, feels like an abstract concept, like it’s a million threads of _possible_ and _maybe,_ but none of the strings intersect.

You feel different.

Your body feels sturdier, you feel weight in places you didn’t experience before. Your bones thrum and tingle, they sit in your body like hollow metal. From a small crack in the ragged curtains you can catch a sliver of the sky.

You watch, out the window, as rain falls. You wait. And you realize with stunted shock, and a dash of horror as the rain slows. Slows to a near halt and you’re at the window with a hand pressed to the cool pane, watching a drop with clarity that you shouldn’t have.

You can see it, like you’ve zoomed in with a camera, and captured it, frame by frame.

The fire crackles, but not the way it’s supposed to. It’s fractured, a thousand near silent pops and hisses of the wood, and you hear every millisecond of it.

And on the horizon, you see a spot of black.

Black as the night sky. It nears, grows a shape.

Only as the black shape shifts, bows, and arches in the sky do you realize what you’re looking at. It’s Castiel in flight.

Back from wherever he flew. You’re cold.

You shouldn’t be able to see him fly. Shouldn’t be able to see him in process of flight, and you wonder, just how fast are you moving? Can he see you standing at the window?

Will you be stuck like this? Watching the world move around you as if constrained and girded by water?

All too soon you’re reminded of that strange world, the world with clouds pinned to sky, and flat colors, and no sound.

His eyes, those eyes, burn in your memory. Clear-cut, and constricting, and much like fire they make you wary, give you cause for caution, but also entrance you and urge you closer. It’s that innate draw, the strange desire for the need to approach fire and feel its warmth and vitality which causes you to reach out.

You tentatively skim it, your eyes closed as you exhale a breath and you wonder in your thoughts. Wonder to that room where the mirror of his world cracked and you saw an inch of his power, felt an iota of his presence.

The glimmer- the waver of air around him-

**Miss me already, child?**

When you open your eyes it’s dark, pitch dark everywhere. There is no horizon, no sky, no floor, just black.

You’re alone, utterly.

There is distance to the darkness, it is not oppressive and suffocating, merely empty. Despite the knot of fear in your stomach, you begin walking for no other reason than to appear blasé.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” You retort flatly, all too aware of the nature and flavor your spinning your words with. You’ve more than a feeling that he could kill you if he wanted, and you’ve a feeling he wants to. “I’m just…curious.”

A chuckle in your ear, breath blown across your ear and you stiffen, stiffen like a board as a familiar hand reaches over your shoulder to drag your hair to your back.

You swallow hard. “How long are you going to wear his face?” you ask and earn another chuckle.

He breezes past you, that towering frame of muscle and devil-may-care and carefully contained violence that he wears with as much ease at the army green jacket he now adorns. There’s no dirt on him though, not this time, and there’s no tang of sweat and earth.

This entity, wearing Dean’s likeness, saunters ahead assuredly, as if he has a destination in mind. There’s that shimmer around him still, the air humming with it.

He peers at you over his shoulder-

**Walk with me.**

-you meet his eyes and blink sharply.

“Why?” You narrow your eyes at him, and curl your hands into loose fists.

He stops short, his upper body jerking forward a few inches at the abruptness, and his head cocks to the side. He’s quiet, silent as he breathes, his broad shoulders rising and falling steadily, slow, calculated.

Suddenly, he stands ram-rod straight and whirls to face you, his expression lax. But his eyes are aglow, bright and livid with some emotion you’ve never encountered before. In a flash he’s inches away from you, dwarfing your smaller form in size and height, and a scent washes over you. Something that isn’t Dean.

Iron, and smoke, and burning metal punches you and you practically gag at its intensity.

“Fine. Then _leave._ ” He quietly tells you, tone even and balanced, but the threat is there, in subtext. His violent eyes narrow a fraction in thought, lips pursed flat. His hands are clasped behind his back, but one comes up between you, index and middle fingers together and extended.

You don’t move an inch. Your limbs have turned to stone. You don’t break eye-contact, even when the tips of his fingers touch your forehead.

“Go!” he hisses, and shoves you.

You stumble back, reality crashing into you like a freight train and fall down onto your ass, chest heaving. You slap a hand over your chest, your heart hammering wildly against your ribcage, sweat rolls down the back of your neck, and your stomach roils with the very real threat of nausea.

You’ve no idea what you just did, where you went, how you did whatever the hell you just did.

**Don’t bother me so pointlessly. Next time you do I might have you literally cough up a lung.**

You comb a hand through your hair, “Yeah. Yeah, ok.”

Castiel is nearly upon the door, and you clamber to your feet, and rush back to that armchair, mind roaring like a waterfall.

You can only venture a guess, but you think you might have just invaded his little world, pushed your way in. He didn’t seem surprised to see you there, but you got the notion that your arrival was unexpected and unwelcome.

There’s tension in you, wrapped around every ligament and bone like a cord of rope encased in silk, and the sensation isn’t altogether unfamiliar. It’s what you felt every second of that strange landscape, it burrowed into you, hijacked the currents of veins and made your blood its home.

You feel like you could snap at any second, and you close your eyes and rein in your breathing. But this time you don’t venture out, you curl in tight, and push everything else away until there’s only the expansion of your diaphragm, and the shrinking of it.

When Castiel finally and truly arrives he finds you several shades paler and with a sheen of cold sweat spread across your brow and he frowns thinly.

“Y/N, are you alright?” his voice is soft, no louder than the dying fire and your brow pinches tighter. After a moment, you nod. But Cas isn’t satisfied. He approaches on near-silent feet and crouches in front of you, piercing blue eyes roving your face in search of answers. “Is there anything I can do?”

You peel your eyes open, and wipe at your forehead with the back of your hand. “No, I’m just- just trying to wrap my head around…everything.” You explain blandly, and his expression loosens in sympathy.

Castiel holds your heavy gaze for many moments, his own growing heavier in premature apology. “Now is not the best time, but sooner rather than later I think-” he muses aloud brokenly, and cuts off suddenly, his blue orbs aimlessly wandering the criss-cross pattern of your shoelaces.

He lifts his gaze. “There are things you should know. As I’m sure you’re aware, not everyone that’s going to come after you is going to be human.” He can already see the exhaustion seeping into you, the ache, and he’s sorry but he’s going to do everything he can to keep you alive.

“Angels, demons…maybe even monsters…”

You rub at your eyes. “Well, I’m not human…and you’re here, so call me naive, but I think I’ll be okay.” One of his hands curls around your calf, and you turn your attention to the glowing embers of the fire.

“You’re naïve,” he tells you gently, a drop of amusement in his voice and your lips twitch minutely. There are grey half-moons under your eyes, and they are only made more visible by the pallor of your skin. He can’t imagine what you went through while you were unconscious. “I am not naïve. I can’t protect you from everything. All I can do is try to equip you and hope it will be enough.”

From your peripherals you watch him wait on you, and you watch the embers glow faintly, growing dimmer with every second. Ashes tumble, dark and black, and they disperse mid-air and rise up the chimney on warm air currents.

You have a moment of retrospection there in that chair with an angel kneeling at your feet. You think, suddenly, of a darkened alcove and the roaring of a waterfall, the endless loop of churning water and bobbing waves. Rocky walls glimmering with condensation, the drip of water from the damp ceiling.

The sky is hidden by tree branches, but the sun filters through in strong, thin slices, throwing diamonds on the surface of the water. You think of blond hair, and warm honey-eyes, and a carefree laugh. You think of a musty blanket on the hard ground, and nature-made shelves of jagged rock with baubles hidden in their crevices.

You think of his cool fingertips on the back of your hand, the warm underside of your wrist, and you think of that moment you allowed yourself- with his head slightly bent, eyelashes fanning down over his cheeks, lips pushed out in a light pout, his hair a wavy mess, awash in different tones of blond, you remember your heartbeat speeding, and hoping that he didn’t notice -and you recall the promise you made. To him. To yourself.

You blink the nostalgia from your gaze and turn your attention to Castiel. You’re tired, there’s no denying that, but more than you are tired- you’re desperate. Desperate for meaning, for reason. Desperate to prove…

You’re tired. But resolved. “What do I need to know?” you ask him, jaw set, and his eyes glint with sorrow, but they also shine with pride. And desperation that matches your own.

“We’ll start with angels,” Castiel says and stands, he makes his way to the battered coffee table in the center of the room and beckons you follow him with a hand. He’s explaining before you’re even out of the chair, “There are sigils you need to memorize, many symbols that have many uses against angels.” He doesn’t search for a pen and paper, no. Instead he sits down at the table, legs crossed and uses his index finger to write.

The wood hisses, smoke rises from underneath the tip of his finger as he begins to draw- write? -these symbols and sigils you need to memorize. You stand behind him and watch over his shoulder as strange foreign shapes come to life on the surface of this coffee table and you listen aptly, all your attention riveted on Cas as he explains what each of these things mean: their literal translation, and their probable uses.

And that’s how you two spend the entirety of the night. By sunrise your mind is sluggish, is begging for a respite, but you’ve been wrong two times too many when he’s asked for the use of a group of symbols, and once you’ve merely just stared at him sheepishly.

So, he doesn’t relent. And neither do you.

And by midday, you have a strong foothold in Enochian, at least in written Enochian. Spoken Enochian is altogether different, as he proved when you mused aloud if you would able to ‘speak angel’.

“So,” you stretch your legs out, and idly trace the jagged shape of the beginning of an angel ward on the bottom of the table, and Castiel bends at the hip in his seated position to look at you under the table. “Have you been on the receiving end of any of these?”

After a moment of silence you turn your head to look at him and meet his pained expression. You find the answer in the pull of his eyebrows and the rigid line of his lips and you hum,

“Ah, so you can guarantee the effectiveness of all this. Good to know.” With a last idle stroke of your finger, you roll out from underneath the table, and take a gander at the scorch marks on the top of the table.

Castiel casts his gaze off towards the door, his mind wandering. He’s thinking of all the times he’s been banished, the uncontrolled plummets he’s been thrown into, the violent and abrupt landings and the mind rocking confusion of ending up somewhere he never intended to be.

“Question!” you chirp and hop to your feet, standing on your tip-toes as you stretch your arms above your head. You take his silence in stride, not needing an actual response to know he’s listening, not needing a response to entice you into continuing. Before, you might have waited, but now, “Can other angels find me?”

Castiel regards you inquisitively, a tad humored as you try to crack your back with no success. “Not unless they’ve had contact with the book. You’re hidden, Y/N.”

Right. You are the biggest secret of Heaven. Or whatever.

“Given your…state of being…you can’t be possessed by a demon, your mind can’t be read by anyone,” Castiel quirks a brow, and looks down at his hands in his lap as you start to meander around the cabin, your legs are cramped from sitting all night. “As an added measure I can carve Enochian runes you’re your ribcage to ensure you remain completely hidden from angels.”

That stops you short, in the middle of a lunge and you snap your head sideways to look at him, hands on your hips. “But you wouldn’t be able to find me either.” You say, and Castiel doesn’t miss the tone of firm rejection at the idea. That he wouldn’t be able to find you.

It makes his lips twitch into a small smile. “Are you not listening? I’ve had contact with the book.” As if he would willingly put you into a situation that leaves you out of his reach. Absurd.

You blink. “Oh. Yeah…right.” Teeth in your cheek, you continue your lunges. And then you stop. “Wait! What if an angel somehow gets their hands on the book?” you stand straight and face him but your hands are still on your hips.

“Then I’d guess we’d better hope that the other angel is slower and weaker than I am.” He blinks at you, unimpressed and you huff, hotly,

“That’s…terrible.” You finally settle on, border-line pouting and Castiel leans back into the couch, arms folded over his chest.

His eyes narrow in your direction, “Hopefully, if that happens, you’ll act wisely and use something I’ve taught you.” His eyes drop pointedly to the table, sharply. And then they flick up at you, and you have the good grace to be embarrassed.

In a bid to save face you change the topic slightly. “Right, okay. So, tell me about demons.”

Castiel’s eyes glow with mirth, and he smirks at your predictability. He waves a hand at the coffee table and the past 8 hours of scorch marks disappear. The table now unblemished, he curls the fingers of one hand in a ‘come hither’ motion at you and you pad over.

He begins talking when you settle beside him on the floor, giving you a basic run-down of what they are exactly, where they originated, and the hierarchies before he delves into their weaknesses and strengths.

And once again, you hang onto his every word, and swear to lock it away in a part of your brain that won’t rot. You ask questions, repeat important key elements, and try as quick as you can to memorize all the traps he shows you.

As he explains things to you though, something prickles at the back of your mind. A presence, cold in demeanor, but fiery in intentions and suddenly it feels like _he’s_ at your shoulder, peering over you.

**Mmm. The way he talks about demons…I guess they don’t make them like they used to.**

_What the hell do you want,_ you think, and you swear you feel the heat and weight of a hand on your shoulder, but Castiel is writing with one hand and the other is in his lap.

**Honestly? Nothinng. I’m just…curious. I wonder if these traps were devised by angels…or if he needed these to keep them all in line?**

_He?_ You ponder, and barely resist the urge to look over your shoulder, you know full-well no one is behind you. _He, who?_ You ask, but you receive no answer, and you return your focus to Castiel.

You and him spend the entire day indoors, spending all that time going over angels and demons, and no you don’t mean the book by Dan Brown. He quizzes you with no real pattern, and it’s only after you manage to go an entire hour without answering wrong that he lets up. In a way.

Before the night is done he carves those Enochian symbols into your ribcage and he does so knowing how much more painful the experience will be for you as compared to a normal human. Castiel grazes it, the seal, he feels the wall of the seal, and he senses the evil behind it, senses the malevolence and brutality, the raw hatred.

And it’s in that moment that Castiel, after only catching a small glimpse of the thing inside you, is genuinely afraid for you. But he doesn’t say a word, only forces a smile as you cuss at him because “that hurt like a son of a bitch!”, and he pats you on the shoulder in consolation.

Far in the back of his mind, he wishes he had someone to talk to. To confide in. He can’t talk to Heaven, lest they send someone. He can’t talk to the Winchesters, not while you still hate them. He is left alone in his worry, in his directionless march.

And you’re none the wiser. He wonders how long he can keep up this façade of someone who knows what he’s doing? For everyone’s sake he hopes it’s a long time.

**Author's Note:**

> Lord Almighty, I'm having such a good time with all these characters, not going to lie. This new trio...I'm torn. Because I like their dynamic, their relationship with each other, but...Damn. Can't say anything else, don't want to give any spoilers. The first chapter was a mixture of everyone, just so you all could get a broad viewpoint of who plays a part in this, what's going on, etc. I'll most likely dedicate chapters to one group instead of shoving everybody into one chapter. Maybe...  
> Anyway, Chapter One is done, thanks for being here.   
> Take it easy, loves. Life is rough.


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